Wicked Grace: The Knight's Suit
by attackamazon
Summary: Neither Blackwall nor the Inquisitor had lived virtuous and uncomplicated lives before the Inquisition. Everyone has something to hide. But, as they work to save the world, maybe they hold the key to saving each other as well. Scenes from a romance, from Blackwall's perspective. [Blackwall/F!Treveylan]
1. Prologue: The Angel of Mercy

_Meatspace has sort of captured my attention away from my hobby fic writing for awhile, but I couldn't resist Blackwall as a character. Spoiler warnings here at the beginning: if you haven't finished Inquisition and you want to be surprised, you might want to wait._

 _Usually I like to tell a very linear, narrative type of story, but I thought I'd try something new with this piece. I usually write female PoV characters, but I wanted to look at the Blackwall romance from Blackwall's PoV, so that's a little bit of a change for me. The scenes for this piece skip forward a little bit instead of picking up one right after the other, but for those who have played through the game, it should be easy to figure out where they fit into the story. Blackwall strikes me as being the type of guy who has a complex inner life, so I wanted to think about why he made the decisions he did and what he would actually be like in a relationship with the Inquisitor. This first chapter is sort of a setup, to get a feel for the Inquisitor character before we get to Blackwall._

 _I hope you enjoy reading it, because I certainly enjoyed writing it! Feedback is most certainly welcome._

* * *

" _The world bears no balsam for mistakes;  
_ _Men crown the knave and scourge the tool  
_ _That did his will. But thou, my lord,  
_ _Be merciful to me, a fool."_

 _~Edward Rowland Sill_

The cold shore of the mountain lake below the village of Haven was one of the few places where it was still possible to find some peace and quiet away from the overcrowding and noise of the fledgling Inquisition. With the surface a solid sheet of thick ice, the few fishing boats pulled up into their winter moorings on the gravelly beach, and the sharp wind, there was little reason for either the villagers or the soldiers to spend time there. So, naturally, that was where Aelis gravitated to now, being freshly returned from a complete disaster of a mission in Val Royeaux and finding the makeshift tavern to be too crammed with bodies and voices to get properly crocked in.

It wasn't surprising that the tavern was the most popular place in the village at the moment. There was a lot to drink about lately. The disaster at the Conclave and the resultant swirling green vortex of doom that gaped from the ruined sky. Death and destruction rampant, demons spewing from holes in the Fade to ravage the countryside. The end of the world. Everywhere you looked there was a reason. Aelis couldn't begrudge the others their moments of solace in the embrace of liquid forgetfulness, but she found it impossible to drink herself into a sufficient stupor when there were two dozen soldiers and civilians watching her to see how the Holy Herald of Andraste held her liquor.

Herald of Andraste, indeed. _Believe whatever children's stories you like, but leave me out of it,_ she had growled back at Cassandra the last time the issue had come up. _Does it look like anyone is at the helm of this sodding great horror of a universe?_ The Seeker now avoided her whenever possible, and that was just fine with Aelis.

She settled herself down on a rock, rubbed a gloved hand over her face as steam sighed between her lips like dragon breath, and pulled the cork on a naggin of questionable whiskey. It tasted vaguely of tar and regret, but it numbed the inside of her mouth and throat nicely, and so she assumed it was up to the task of numbing the rest of her. She took another sip, leaned her elbows forward onto her knees, and gazed out across the lake, positioning herself to avoid the sight of the Breach to the northwest. She'd seen quite enough of it already for one lifetime.

The whole situation was a mess. Haven had been a backwater pilgrimage stop before now; it hadn't been built to handle being the epicenter of a disaster. It was practically bursting at the seams. The soldiers already had to camp outside the palisade walls, which had been built in an attempt to fortify the village and which probably wouldn't keep out so much as an especially determined druffalo. The supplies were holding, but only just. And, having just returned from a spectacularly failed diplomatic entreaty to the Chantry Mothers, it was apparent to Aelis that no help was imminent. The Chantry was too busy flailing around like a beheaded chicken to offer assistance and the Templar leadership - if that Lord Seeker bastard they had met in Val Royeaux was any indication - had apparently all gone nug-buggering insane. The mages were problematic at the best of times and Andraste forbid the nobility of either Orlais and Ferelden lift a finger, so it was beginning to look very much like the Inquisition was the only chance this Maker-forsaken world had.

 _We're done for, then,_ Aelis thought, letting the whiskey burn across her tongue in penance for thinking it and blowing out a long breath. Cullen, Josephine, and Leliana were doing the best they could to hold everything together - better than most would have done - but even Thedas' best at the top of their game couldn't turn a broken down plow nag into a knight's charger. It was really just a matter of time now.

 _You might want to consider running_ , Varric had told her once the dust had settled and they were all out of immediate danger, _I've written enough tragedies to know how this turns out._

"I'll drink to that," Aelis murmured to herself, tilting back the bottle again and wincing, though less so now that the buzz of the whiskey had started to work on her sense of taste.

She'd been waiting for the right moment to quietly slip away and leg it since those first awful, confusing moments in the basement of Haven's Chantry when she had woken up with chains on her wrists, a glowing terror branded on her hand, and a head full of vague and frightening memories that didn't make any sense. Now that Cassandra seemed unlikely to hunt her down and maul her like a damned Mabari hound if she left and now that it was much less likely she'd be lynched for a Divine-murdering criminal in the next town she set foot in, and especially since the Mark seemed to have stabilized and the danger of it draining the life out of her was less than it was, the time seemed just about right for Aelis to make her exit before something worse happened.

The problem was, where would she go? She didn't have a home to go to anymore, not with her brother dead along with so many others who had been at the Conclave. Farrell might take her in if she crawled back to her old mercenary company, but she'd slit her own throat and likely save him the trouble before she did that. She would find something, though. Even serving some flea-bitten backwater Ferelden dog-lord while the world burned down into oblivion would be better than pretending to be a divine messenger to a bunch of religious loonies here at the end of all things.

"What are we drinking to?" inquired a smooth, faintly Orlesian voice from somewhere behind and to the right of Aelis and she startled guiltily, gripping the bottle tight to keep from dropping it on the stones. Turning, she saw the silent, slender form of the Inquisition's spymaster approaching, wrapped in her dark blue cloak, the sound of her chainmail hauberk muffled by layers of cloth. Leliana smiled from under the shadow of her hood, and that smile sent chills down Aelis' spine as it always did. For all her politeness and poise, the Left Hand of the Divine was no one to trifle with. Whether all the stories were true, Aelis didn't know, but she didn't want to find out first hand either.

Aelis stood, trying not to look directly at the other woman, but trying not to look entirely away either in case either of those things might tip the spymaster off to what she had just been thinking. She shrugged in what she hoped was a casual manner.

"Nothing important. Just remembering something Varric told me on the way back from the city," Aelis replied and proffered the bottle. "Drink? It's vile, but it was made by dwarves so I think it's supposed to taste that way. Put some hair on your - well, something anyway."

"I think I'll pass," Leliana replied, her smile unfading as she glanced out across the lake and folded her hands behind the small of her back comfortably. "I like to take a stroll down here myself sometimes. It clears the mind."

"Well, don't let me interrupt you." Aelis started to move away, glad for an excuse to go. "I'll find somewhere else to finish this off." The spymaster shook her head, lightly holding up a hand in a gesture of pause.

"I was hoping I would run into you, actually." Leliana's gaze, serene and sharp at the same time, did not move from surveying the mountains and the woodland across the lake as she spoke. Her voice was unhurried, devoid of anything either alarming or comforting. "I have some news that I thought you might want to hear in private away from the others."

Aelis felt her heartbeat began to thump a little faster in her chest as she paused, waiting for the other boot to drop. In the small amount of time she had been working for the Inquisition, she had seen enough to know that Leliana was a ruthless piece of work and frighteningly thorough. And there were enough secrets in Aelis' past to make her wary. Who knew what the Inquisitions' agents might have turned up? Or, maybe it was a ruse to try and flush out information from Aelis herself. Aelis had had enough experience with shady characters to know that there was always a trick, always a bit of bait thrown out to hook a bigger fish, and Leliana was a master of that art. She felt her palms begin to sweat.

"Oh? Well, do tell, then. Can't think of what it might be." Aelis noted the falseness in her own tone as she attempted to seem unconcerned and cursed mentally. She wasn't good at this. She was a warrior, used to solving problems by hitting them until they went away. This wasn't her element.

"I've recently been in contact with a Commander Farrell of Farrell's Shieldbreakers. He sends his regards."

Aelis felt as if her blood had momentarily stopped flowing. A creeping feeling that started in her gut, spread up her spine, and suffused the base of her skull, making the small hairs on her neck stand on end along the way. She didn't dare show any reaction, though she could tell by the way Leliana's lips turned just slightly further up at the corners, that the spymaster knew the bait had worked as expected.

"Did he?" Aelis' mouth was dry, the question fainter than she would have liked. Farrell's regards were something she wanted even less than the spymaster's attention. She glanced uneasily around, as much to determine a way to escape as to ensure that there were no prying eyes or ears within hearing distance. Leliana laughed, a soft hum through her nose.

"He's not here. I've taken the liberty of settling your differences with the Shieldbreakers. We can't have the Herald of Andraste picked off by assassins or befalling some other 'accident' before the Breach has been closed, can we?"

"Assassins?" asked Aelis, her heart sinking further. She hadn't parted on good terms with the old bastard and she had expected him to be angry, but angry enough to spend the coin to send an assassin after her? She swallowed, shifting her foot anxiously on the gravel, and sighed. "Right."

"And I've made certain that your involvement in the incident at Pont de Galet will remain unknown."

For the second time, Aelis felt her heart nearly stop. She turned her gaze slowly to Leliana's clear grey eyes, which were watching her reaction with calculating interest.

"Nothing happened at Galet." Aelis emphasized each word as they came out through gritted teeth, already knowing that the spymaster knew otherwise. A hard note crept into her voice, breaking the name of the village in the back of her throat as the memory of that awful campaign stirred from its uneasy rest.

Leliana's expression remained still, unconcerned. "I think the villagers who died there and their surviving families might disagree."

"They were billeting enemy soldiers. The patron made his wishes clear. Farrell gave the order. I followed my orders. That's what soldiers do. That's war." Aelis felt her face growing hot, her teeth clenching and her breath quickening slightly as she fought against the thoughts that assailed her. The smell of smoke, the raw feel of dust and ash in her throat, the deadness that crept into her mind that anesthetized her thoughts and allowed her hands and legs and voice to do what needed to be done - it all threatened to rush back on her. It had been more than a year ago now, but the images and sensations had never left her completely. They had ceased haunting her in the day, but still populated her dreams and plagued her in her darker moments. She shook her head as if to physically clear it.

Leliana observed her for a moment and then turned her body fully to face Aelis. There was an oddness to the quirk of her brow, that was not quite sympathy. More like pain, but that was not it either. The spymaster nodded.

"Farrell has agreed to forget that you were ever involved in his company. He'll make sure that anyone else who might remember you forgets as well. You were never at Pont de Galet. Nor were you at the subsequent massacres at Murraille or Gazon."

"How much did you have to promise him to bring about that miracle?" Aelis retorted, bitterly. She scowled at the ground. "I know how Farrell works. He never forgets. He'll smile and compliment your negotiation skills and then put a knife between your shoulders before you've had a chance to fully turn your back. If you think he'll just let this go-"

"I have my methods," replied Leliana calmly, with the smallest of shrugs. "He might be a criminal, but he isn't a fool. He knows when to walk away from something bigger than him. But, more to my point, I wanted you to understand that I was not making an idle suggestion when I mentioned that the Inquisition could help _you_ personally. You can walk away from Pont de Galet unburdened now. Those who would seek justice or vengeance for your part in it need never know your identity. No one in the Inquisition, aside from me, need know either."

"I'll know." Aelis kicked a stone furiously out onto the ice, listening to it crack and clatter across the frozen surface. She looked down, feeling the Left Hand's eyes on her, as an uncomfortable thought struck her. "You want something in return. What?"

"Consider it a gift," the spymaster replied, her tone turning up cheerfully despite the seriousness of the subject. "You remind me of someone. The Grey Wardens gave him a second chance at life, and in the end it was his efforts that ended the Blight. The Inquisition can do the same for you. If you won't believe that I would simply look out for your best interest as a member of the Inquisition, then accept the favor in honor of my dear friend."

She continued before Aelis could point out that the Hero of Ferelden had died in the end, even if heroically, and that the comparison was not comforting. "I hope that you'll think on it. We need you. Not just the Mark, but people like you. I don't know if Andraste sent you to us. Even if She did not, you are here and you have the power to save lives. That means something in itself, yes?"

Aelis stared hard at the lake for a moment, feeling her shoulders and arms clench and unclench with painful uncertainty as she pondered the spymaster's words. The urge to bolt was still strong. She had risked her life in battle hundreds of times now. She had long ago settled her fear of death. Even so, fear still stalked the edges of her mind. Fear of failure. Fear of defeat. Fear of the part of herself deep down that reveled in the skill and release of the killing. Farrell, the sly old snake, had seen all of those things in her from the beginning and twisted them to his advantage. She saw that all too clearly now. And she was free of the old bastard for the first time in six years, through both the efforts of her brother and now Leliana. Her brother had died for the peace that the Conclave would bring. Someone, at least, needed to pay for that. And, if Aiden were alive, this is where he would want to be, trying his best to help the survivors and mend the hole in the sky. If the world was doomed anyway, then there were surely worse ways to spend the last few weeks of her life. Better to go down fighting than just waiting for the end to come. Aelis sighed.

"Right. So, it's back to Redcliffe with me, I suppose, to try and talk some sense into the mages. I'll see if I can track down your Warden while I'm there. What was his name?"

"Blackwall," Leliana replied, her smile somewhat easier and less guarded as Aelis turned to face her. Rumor had it that the spymaster had once been a bard, and a lovely and somewhat famous one, too. Though the years since the last Blight seemed to have hardened and tempered Leliana to a razor's edge, Aelis thought she might have just caught a glimpse through that smile of the woman the spymaster had been all those long years ago. She returned the gesture with a hesitant smile of her own.

"Well, then, Warden Blackwall had better watch out. He's got a command audience with the bloody Herald of Andraste herself."


	2. Act I: The Knight of Swords

_Of all evil I deem you capable: Therefore I want good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws. ~ Nietzsche_

The evening light cast a soft glow over the hinterlands around Redcliffe, gilding the trees and hills with gold. The air was cool. Summer was giving way to autumn and a gentle breeze rippled through the forest leaves. The birds twittered and a fennec fox yipped somewhere in the distance. Blackwall stood at the edge of the shallow pond that lay a few yards from the Inquisition camp, surveying the mat of lotus pads and the dark red blooms peeking up here and there from the clear water. The first of the frogs were tuning up their voices for the nightly chorus. A glorious sound, better to his ears than the sound of any Chantry choir. Off to one side, in the distance, the smoke from cook-fires trailed up from the refugee camp at the valley crossroad. It was hard to believe that this idyllic countryside had been a warzone only weeks ago.

The Inquisition was making good progress in the region. Better than Blackwall had expected from a small force with few resources, really. The army was a patchy lot. Just a handful of ex-templars, some veteran soldiers whose respective patrons had died at the Conclave, a few companies of mercenaries, and a cud of green recruits that barely knew which bit of a sword was the pointy end. But, they were the only ones with boots and supplies on the ground already, and they were getting little enough help from the rest of the Thedas. The Chantry reeled, the nobles postured and waited to see how best to work the situation to their own benefit, and the countryside burned. It was always the common people who suffered, whatever the struggle, and Blackwall was gratified to see that the Inquisition hadn't forgotten the smallfolk. Humanitarian, as well as military, efforts were well underway. The refugees around Redcliffe were fed and warmed and made as safe as they could be. It was half of the reason he had stuck around after his visit to Haven. The other half was more complicated.

All of the Inquisition's people worked hard - their cause was desperate enough, after all - but a large part of their success was due to their primary agent in the field, a Marcher noblewoman named Aelis Trevelyan. The supposed Herald of Andraste. Most of the people Blackwall had talked to back at Haven referred to her as if she were the second coming of Andraste herself, though her closer compatriots - the elven mage Solas, the storyteller Varric, the Navarran Seeker - had more nuanced opinions about her. It was true that she had fallen from the Fade and later risked her life to stop the Breach from expanding, at least. Everything else seemed to be a muddle of hearsay and superstition.

For Aelis' part, she vehemently contradicted any claims of holiness. She scoffed at the idea that any god in its right mind would choose her as some sort of divine messenger, which Blackwall found oddly comforting as well as amusing. A spark of humility didn't go amiss in a leader, holy or otherwise. The subject seemed to irritate her, and so he had avoided it. He supposed it didn't actually matter at the end of the day. If the world survived this, then what would be remembered was who the people thought she was, not who she really was. Theology wasn't his strong point, besides. Blackwall wasn't sure what to make of it all, but no one could deny that Aelis produced results and turned heads. She had certainly gotten his attention right from the start.

"Missing your old stomping grounds?" a voice asked from behind him and he turned to see Aelis approaching, as if she had sensed him thinking about her. She paused a few yards away and smiled. The day had been a long and busy one and, though her face was freshly washed, stray red hairs stood out around her head and caught the light like the copper halo of a saint in a Chantry frieze. Blackwall found himself staring.

She wasn't what most men would call beautiful, though she did have the heart-shaped face, well-boned cheeks, and recurving lips that were considered a mark of noble breeding in the Free Marches. Her skin had the scoured look of someone who spent most of their time out in the elements, and a series of scars marred her forehead, cheeks, and jaw. Evidence of her profession, Blackwall knew and he couldn't hold that against her. Add to that the fact that she was tall for a woman - nearly as tall as Blackwall himself - broad-shouldered, and well-muscled and she was as formidable a fighter as he had ever laid eyes on. Women were common enough in the armies of Thedas, but most were light infantry, archers, or cavalrywomen. It was rare to see one with the size and strength to wield a two-hander well. He'd seen her roar through a gaggle of enemies like an Avvar berserker enough times already to be convinced of her skill.

Finding that his mind had gone blank, Blackwall fumbled for a response.

"Just taking a moment to appreciate a fine afternoon," he told her. Then, because he knew it would make her laugh, he let his eyes drop and ride quickly up her body again in an exaggerated way. He was right. Aelis rewarded him with a chuckle, one eyebrow arching in acknowledgement of the suggestion.

Despite her unconventional appearance, Blackwall had sussed out early on that Aelis had a figure under all that armor. She dressed to hide it like many military woman, but he'd caught glimpses here and there on their travels and while off-duty in the tavern. She carried herself like someone more used to tavern brawls than salons and ballrooms, but her accent betrayed her noble upbringing - which she also tried to hide. No soft lady was Aelis, but there was something appealing to him in that. Perhaps all the more so because she seemed to like what she saw when she looked at him as well.

The flirting was a game she had started. _You're oddly charming for a man I found wandering the forest,_ he could remember Aelis teasing him one evening after they had returned to Haven. She had a brazen wit and it had been quite awhile since he'd had received that sort of attention from a young woman. Blackwall had found himself sporting back before his better judgement could assert itself, not least because it was so unexpected. The Herald seemed to keep most people at arm's length, a sentiment Blackwall understood well enough. Though, it was good to see her smile once in awhile. It felt good to be the cause of that smile. And, Blackwall supposed, it was harmless enough. If it really was the end of the world, it might be the last opportunity.

"You mentioned you wanted to take a look at some of the old Warden camps in the area," Aelis explained, getting to the point though her gaze and smile still lingered warmly. "There's one at the ruins of Fort Calenhad just a short distance from here. We cleared a rift out of the area last time we were passing, so it should be quiet. Time enough to have a look and get back before dark, if you want. Care for an evening stroll?"

After he had been debriefed at Haven, Blackwall had mentioned his interest in the old camps marked out on his maps, and Aelis had agreed to take a look if they could find one. There was so much to be done that he hadn't really expected her to make time for something most would consider frivolous, but here she was offering after all. It pleased him that she had remembered and that she would keep her word. He smiled back.

"I think I could just about manage that. Lead the way."

As they passed through the camp, Aelis stopped to inform Seeker Cassandra that they were going to take a short patrol over the hill and would return soon. Although the Herald was theoretically in charge of these field missions, being the only one who could close the rifts and therefore the one whose life was most at risk, Cassandra had actually declared the Inquisition in the first place and there was uneasy question as to who really had the final say. Blackwall noted the way that both women bristled when they were around each other, but the exchange was short and polite enough. Varric had related to him the story of how Aelis had fallen out of the Fade, how she had originally been a suspect in the destruction of the Conclave, and how the Herald and the Seeker's first meeting had been a violent one as a result. Whatever had happened, it seemed to have spawned a powerful grudge.

With duty discharged, they set out, descending the rough path and crossing the dirt road that snaked between grassy cliffs and broken stone up into the foothills. The further they retreated from camp, the more relaxed Aelis seemed to grow. It was easy to forget that she was as young as she was - barely more than twenty if what he'd heard was right. At that age, all that had been on Blackwall's mind was fighting and girls, not saving the bloody world. It was gratifying to see the girl in her, rather than the warrior, coming out now as her brow unknit and her gate slowed to a less aggressive stride.

"So, what are you expecting to find anyway?" she asked, conversationally, as they walked. Hearing the serrated sharpness fade companionably from her voice when she spoke to him infected Blackwall with the same easiness as well. It made him feel younger and less burdened, less alone than he had in a very long time. The walk reminded him of afternoon strolls through the royal parks in Val Royeaux during the halcyon days of his tenure in Orlais. His life had been both easier and harder at once, then, only in different ways. There had been fighting and death and politics, to be sure, but also a fair share of pleasure. A good dinner and a pretty woman on his arm - and hopefully later in his bed - had been all he had wanted of an autumn evening back then. The thought glowed in his mind briefly and - as it always did - faded to ash as other memories were dredged up along with it. He steadied himself, sobering again.

"Anything of use. The Wardens aren't just brutes with swords, you know. If we happen to stumble upon a cache, we could find maps or records. Something that could help the Inquisition."

It wasn't entirely untrue. The original Blackwall - the one who had actually been a Warden - had told him enough about the Grey Wardens that he could flimflam his way through most questions that came up if he leaned heavily on the mysterious air that the Wardens cultivated and didn't give too many details. Mostly, he just wanted to see the places that real Grey Wardens had been. Circumstances had prevented Blackwall from joining them, but he could live the life of a Warden as best he could and walk in their footsteps. That might be close enough to the real thing anyway.

Talking overly much about the subject was risky, however. He could easily blow his cover, and Aelis was the last person at present that he wanted to know the sorry truth. As they crested the next hill, Blackwall tried to think of a way to redirect the conversation, but found he needn't have bothered.

"I nearly became a Grey Warden once myself. Did I tell you?" she began, casting a mischievous side-long glance at him though her tone was one of feigned innocence. She was about to start teasing him again. Blackwall decided to play the straight man to the joke, though he was unsuccessful at hiding his smile.

"No, you didn't. What kept you?"

"The recruiter's good sense, really," she admitted, smirking at something in her own mind for a moment and then began, "I'd had a cousin who became a Warden. I only ever met him the once, but he made an impression. He was the closest thing to a real hero I'd ever seen. After that, whenever my brothers played stick-knights in the courtyard, I'd crash in and play at being a Warden. Drove my mother wild with disapproval."

"Of you wanting to be a Warden or just rough-housing with the boys?" Blackwall asked, warming to the story. For as little time as he had known her, he could easily picture Aelis doing something like that. In his mind's eye, he could see her red braid lashing around her face and shoulders as she scuffled with her brothers. A mock Grey Warden with a wooden sword, riding a broom-handle griffin into battle. That image, layered with what he'd seen of her since he'd met her, gave her greater depth and he liked thinking of it.

"Both," answered Aelis, though a shadow passed briefly over her face before her smile was back. Blackwall filed that thought away for later, as she shrugged. "Not that she had anything particular against the Wardens, mind you. They just weren't 'nice'. Mother didn't care much for that sort of thing. If it isn't 'nice' and doesn't make for pleasant conversation over brisks and tea in the parlor with the Grand Cleric, one really shouldn't want to know about it."

The change in inflection in her voice on that last quip, perfectly mimicking the genteel warble of a matronly Marcher noblewoman, set Blackwall to snorting with laughter. Marchers were thin on the ground this far south. Though they were from different cities, it was good to share a jab at the high and mighty back home with a countrywoman, not least someone who hailed from that class herself.

"So, what happened then?" he prompted her, amused and interested now despite his reluctance to talk about the Wardens. This was the most Aelis had ever disclosed about herself and Blackwall wanted to know more about her, both because he was genuinely curious and because it paid to know who you were fighting next to. Harder battles were coming, and so moments like this were invaluable to get to know the man or woman who might be the only thing standing in between you and a grisly end one day.

For, there was a darkness in Aelis at times that troubled him. Blackwall could see it struggling to surface in the way she looked at Cassandra when she thought no one was paying attention, in the snarling bite of her voice when she was angry, and in the vicious way she took apart an enemy piece by bloody piece. She was as hot-blooded as one of the fighting cocks he'd watched set against each other back in Markham as a boy, though that was hardly unusual among warriors of her type. To her credit, she checked herself more often than not, but there was something hardened and hate-filled under all that anger, too - something that twisted her towards destruction just as surely as he could see her conscience pushing back when she went out of her way to help the common folk. Not all of the demons she fought fell from the Fade, that was certain.

Blackwall knew the signs because he had been down that road himself, more than once. No matter how far he ran or where he went or what he did, Rainier would always be there in the end. The monster - the craven, corrupt, selfish, murderous beast - would always be there, waiting for a chance to come back out. Seeing a flash of those same claws and teeth in Aelis alarmed him, but it drew him to her, too. It was like looking into a mirror of himself at the same age. She bore the same conceits and bravado of youth, the same anger and fear crouching inside, and the same chance to get it fatally wrong. She was clearly struggling and, perhaps for his own sake as well as hers, he wanted to see her win.

But Aelis had continued with the story and Blackwall turned his attention outward to her voice again as they wove their way through the sparse woodlands.

"I was thirteen. I'd just had an argument with my parents. They were determined to send me for Templar training, which I wanted nothing to do with. I wanted to go the Academie in Orlais and become a chevalier," she related, pausing for a moment as she scrutinized the woodland ahead. She pointed at a bit of grey stone that made a jagged line just at the tree tops further head. "There's the ruin. Almost there."

As they corrected their course and picked their way onto an old and partially overgrown path that lead to the ancient fort, she continued, "I was angry. The Academie wouldn't accept me without my father's consent, and he wanted me nowhere near the Orlesian wars. While I was sulking in the guardhouse, I overheard one of the men talking about a Grey Warden recruiter in town, and it occurred to me that the Grey Wardens didn't require anyone's consent. If the recruiter wanted me, he could just conscript me. That would show my parents for thinking they could thwart me. I'd always liked the Wardens. Why not? So, I slipped out a window early the next morning and went to go find him."

Blackwall had to work to suppress laughter. In the time that he'd been wandering around under the guise of a Grey Warden recruiter, a dozen or so boys had approached him asking for exactly the same thing young Aelis had gone looking for. He'd turned them all down, kindly, of course, but he knew well enough the shine of near hero-worship in their eyes, the innocent determination in their faces. He'd tried to send them back to their parents with a smile instead of a heartbreak.

"Bet that went over well. Did you find the man, at least?"

"Well, I had no idea where to look for him, did I? I hadn't heard that part," explained Aelis, grinning. "Took me two days to track him down to an inn near the prison, and by that time I'd slept in a stable and gotten into a fistfight with a cook's boy behind a tavern. So, there I was, a gangly girl with a black eye, a busted lip, a torn tunic, and my hair flying out of my braid every which way. I marched right up to the recruiter and looked him in the eye, bold as you please, and told him I wanted to join. Looking back, I can't imagine how he managed to keep a straight face."

"Practice. Lot's of practice," Blackwall chuckled in retort as they arrived at the ruin.

Rays of faint sunlight slanted through the foliage and broken windows of the old tower. Vines and weeds had grown up through crumbling stone, turning what once had been a defensive fort guarding the northern road to a wild place once more. It was quiet now, save for the voices of the birds and insects. Blackwall surveyed it with the eye of the commander he had once been, appreciating the work of the ancient engineers and sappers that had carted stone and fortified the place in the early days of Ferelden's golden age. With many of the walls still sturdy, it was a good place to take shelter from the wind. Exactly the sort of place he imagined the Wardens would find convenient.

"Let's check the bailey," he told Aelis, who nodded. They threaded their way through what had once been the moorings for a portcullis. Blackwall could see the grooves in the stone, though the iron had all rusted to pieces or been carried away ages ago. He glanced at his companion, watching her pause and look the inner courtyard of the fortress with interest. Though he hoped to find the old campsite before the light failed and they had to go back, he wanted to hear the end of her story. "What did the recruiter say?"

"He never let on. He made a show of it, told me it was a serious commitment, and put me through my paces with a training sword. Told me I had talent and he would speak to my father, as my family should know where I had gone," she replied, turning over some stones with her boot. She smiled fondly, remembering. "Good job, too, because I'd never have gone with him if I'd thought he was just escorting me back home so I didn't get into anymore trouble. Which he did. Maker's balls, _that_ was a scene. My father shouted. My mother fainted. The recruiter had the good grace to let me down easy. He said I had the spirit for it, but I was too young, and promised to come back in a few years when I was of age. Told me to train hard and mind my parents in the mean time. I was banned from picking up a sword and given extra lessons to do for a month after that, but that was nothing. A Warden recruiter thought I might be good enough one day to join. I was enchanted."

She squinted at a pile of stones in the western corner of the ruin, between tower and outer wall. "Look over there. Does that look like the remains of a firepit to you?"

Blackwall turned his gaze in the direction she indicated, noting a shallow hollow in the stony ground, with fragments of broken stone strewn around it, right in the crook of the ruin that would provide the best coverage from the wind. Though there were plenty of stones scattered around, the distribution didn't seem natural. He grunted assent.

"Looks like something to investigate either way."

He followed her over to the formation. Indeed, the hollow in the earth looked like it had been scooped out at some point in the past by human hands, though it was partially refilled with level dirt. The pit was too conspicuously round to be chance. Aelis dropped to a knee, her eyes lighting up with interest. She pulled her dagger from her belt and scratched its tip deeply across the soft surface of the dirt.

"Look, there's old ashes. Definitely a campsite," she said, pointing out the blurry, striated layers of char revealed under a layer of dried mud. Her gaze scanned the area and Blackwall knelt beside her, starting to share her excitement.

"They would have slept close to the fire, probably sitting up with their backs to the walls so they couldn't be surprised in their sleep," he noted, and Aelis nodded her assent. She rose and crossed the few feet between the old hearth and the wall, running her hand over the stone.

"I'd keep my sword across my lap while I slept, close to hand," she said, thinking out loud as she plopped down to the ground and leaned back against the wall, just as the men and women who had been at this camp before them would have done, "And anything valuable . . ."

She turned and looked at the narrow corner where the walls joined and her eyebrows raised in surprise. Quickly, she scooted towards the pile of rubble that filled it and began to dig at one of the larger rocks, jostling it free.

"What is it?" Blackwall asked, moving to help her dislodge the stone. He watched her expression screw up with concentration as she reached into the hollow space underneath and pulled out what looked to be a hard, gnarled roll of leather. Sitting back on her heels, Aelis blew dust off of it and picked away pieces of lichen before holding it up to the light.

"I don't know. It's light, though. Hollow."

He took the object from her, absorbed in the magic of the discovery as he turned the thing over in his hands. There was a slight seam in the leather and he followed it up to find the place at the end of the cylinder where a section could be detached. Better and better. "It's a mapcase, I think."

Beaming, pleased with herself, Aelis stood and crowded in to look as he carefully eased open the case. The leather was quite old, the joint swollen with time, but with a few tugs and twists, the seal began to slide free. Blackwall tried not to get his expectations up. It was probably empty. It looked as if it had been discarded. After so long outside, if there was anything there, the contents were probably crumbled to dust, anyway. Still, it would be a fine thing if there were something useful inside. He moved into a ray of light to see better, and spotted a tight curl of dry parchment spiraling in on itself deeper inside the case. There _was_ something.

"Hold this while I see if I can get ease it out," he told Aelis, who obliged. A coil of vellum filled the case and it took them several minutes of breath-holding concentration before Blackwall was able to gently slide the scroll free. The vellum was stained and stiff, cracked in places, but it held together. Someone had backed it with a thin, but sturdy, section of nug leather. Blackwall glanced up to see Aelis gazing at it with an eager look of hope that perfectly mirror his own and felt something inside of him warm a little at that.

They decided to risk unrolling it. Aelis lent her careful fingers to the work. The vellum did not crumble, and soon they were looking at a map of Ferelden, ancient and water spotted, the pen-strokes faded but legible. Handwritten notes were scrawled in the margins in the script of someone long dead. The details were very precise, though towns and cities had been omitted. Built after the time of the mapmaker, Blackwall realized. The most prominent features indicated entrances to the Deeproads and known dens of Darkspawn. Exactly the sort of thing he had been hoping for.

"I think the Inquisition could make use of this," he told Aelis, triumphantly, grinning despite himself. She nodded, returning the sentiment.

"I think you're right. We'll have Leliana and Cullen look it over when we get back to Haven."

A pleasant feeling suffused Blackwall as they carefully rolled up the map and replaced it in its case. He wasn't sure whether it was because his hunch had paid off or because he was contributing something to the Inquisition's cause or because of the way Aelis had looked at him, their hands brushing as they worked together on the map. Perhaps all three. It was a rare emotion and he decided, this once, to let himself be content with it.

With the shadows growing long, they would have to start back soon, but it seemed a shame to leave the ruins so quickly after arriving. Aelis took a seat on a ledge of stone and removed a flask of water from her belt, offering it to him first and then taking a long drink herself. Blackwall, glad for the rest, sat down next to her.

"You never did finish the story," he told her after they had had a moment to savor the quiet of the woods and the pleasantness of a successful mission. He wanted to hear her voice, make the most of this opportunity to see her as she was when not having to play the Herald. He liked this side of her, and he liked that she would let her guard down enough to be this way with him. Any excuse for conversation, though Blackwall couldn't help but be curious as well. "Did the recruiter ever come back?"

Aelis sighed, took another drink from her flask before hanging it back on her belt, and shrugged.

"Don't know. If he did, I'd already bolted before then. I think my mother still blames him for that, though it wasn't his fault."

Ah. They were starting to veer into uneasy territory. There was a slanted, inward look in her eyes that told him he was getting close to something. He didn't want to pry it from her, but he couldn't help wanting to know now that the subject had been breached. He tried humor to keep the conversation on the light side.

"So, you didn't become a Grey Warden or a chevalier, and you're obviously not a Templar. Ran away to join the army, then? You wouldn't be the first. It's a time-honored tradition in the Marches."

Aelis snorted, amused, but her smile wavered. She shook her head.

"No, not the army. I was fifteen when I left home: too young to buy a commission and from too well-known a family to be able to just turn up somewhere and enlist. Well, I was full of piss and vinegar then," she said and shot him a look from under her eyebrows before he could catch her with the obvious quip. "Not a word from you, Warden. Anyway, I was itching to get out of Ostwick so I could prove myself without my family coddling me. Hired myself on with the first company of mercenaries that would have me. Bunch of bastards called Farrell's Shieldbreakers, lead by the biggest bastard of them all. I didn't know any better. I just wanted to fight. They put a proper sword in my hand and off I went."

The way she spat the name of her old company did not escape Blackwall. Her lip curled slightly, remembering something unpleasant. Mercenary life hadn't agreed with her, then. _Good_ , he thought before pressing quickly so she would keep talking.

"So, that's how you ended up at the Conclave then? On a contract?"

"No," replied Aelis, uncomfortably. She wouldn't look him in the eye, but he could see the hint of pain rising into her face, and he felt suddenly guilty for pushing for the information.

"It's none of my business. Everyone's got something in their past that's better left there," he assured her, but she shook her head and sighed, grinding her boot into the stones and dirt self-consciously.

"No, better that you know. Leliana and Josephine hushed up what hadn't already been dealt with, but you have to risk your life out there right along with me. You should know who's guarding your back. I fought with the Shieldbreakers for several years. We were just this side of being brigands most of that time. I worked my way up to being one of Farrell's lieutenants after a couple of years of hard fighting, mostly because I'd had an education and better training than most. We made our living off of petty noble squabbles on both sides of the Orlesian civil war. Ugly stuff. I did things on Farrell's orders that I'm not proud of now. I hated it. Hated him. But I did it all the same, and by then it felt too late. Once you've hit the bottom, it's a long way to climb back up. And then it starts to feel like the only place you belong, you know?"

Blackwall felt his chest constrict with the eerie prophecy of her words. He _did_ know. Too well. She couldn't know anything about his own past, but the parallel echo of it there on her lips made his nerves shiver all the same. He listened, wrapt, as she continued.

"Through it all, I had a brother - Aiden - who never gave up on me. He was a Chantry Brother, a historian of some kind, back in Ostwick. He'd write me letters, reams of them, and keep me up to date on what was going on back home. In every one of them, he'd ask me to come back, or at least come and visit him. After awhile, I couldn't bring myself to write him back anymore. It was too hard. And so, stubbornness being the Trevelyan family trait, he came and found me instead. Walked right into our field camp unexpected one afternoon with his scribal apprentice and a Templar escort. Maker knows how he found us. He announced that if I wouldn't come home of my own accord, he'd hire me to be his bodyguard on the road instead. Right in front of Farrell and the whole crew. You could have knocked them all over with a feather."

"What did you do?"

"I took him up on the offer. I'd had it with Farrell and the whole sorry lot. I knew he wouldn't tangle with a Chantry Brother and a gaggle of Templars. Someone would miss them and it wouldn't be hard to figure out what had happened. So, I packed up my gear with the old bastard shouting in my ear all the while. I told him I'd skin him and leave him for the crows if I ever saw him again and then left with my brother and the Chantry folk. Aiden was insufferable after that. Grinned all the way to Haven. Told everyone we met along the way that I was his personal ruffian. If he hadn't died at the Conclave, he would never have let me forget it." She paused, sadly, and then shook her head. "It should be him here, really. He would have known what to do about this mess."

Hearing the hurt in her voice touched painful places for Blackwall as well. He knew what it was to lose someone who cared about you, to feel like the world was worse for having you in it instead of them. His sister Liddy - ever a quiet child with large, soft eyes in his memory - had affected him in much the same way. As had Warden Blackwall, who had taken a blow meant for Thom Rainier and now lay buried out there on the cliffs. He turned to look at Aelis, her brow knit as she frowned at her knees, thinking heavy thoughts, and knew that this and whatever it was she had done at the behest of her old commander was the source of the festering anger in her. It was a cut too deep and far too familiar, and he could not leave her open and bleeding as he had been left bleeding all those years ago.

"But you're the one who's here. That's not nothing. No one could ask for better than what you're already doing, my lady," he told her, gently, and meant it.

For someone who claimed not to believe in the Maker, Aelis inspired more confidence in Him than a regiment of Templars and Chantry Mothers. She was rough around the edges and made a young commander's mistakes to be sure, but Blackwall had trained enough soldiers in his time to know potential when he saw it. She was plagued by her past, just as he was, but there was still time. She might not be the polished, devout warrior that someone like Cassandra would have preferred, but maybe the world didn't need another plaster saint. Maybe it needed someone like Aelis, who was raw and real and imperfect, who would grit her teeth against even the worst that could happen and get the job done. No, the Inquisition couldn't ask for a better Herald, and everyone but Aelis herself knew it.

Though she usually recoiled and chafed whenever anyone address her as '"lady", Aelis only exhaled a brief laugh, less humor than embarrassment.

"If you say so," she told him. Glancing up, she smiled ruefully, admitting, "That's what they used to call me in the Shieldbreakers. Milady. Because I couldn't shake my accent and because, apparently, I had manners once upon a time. Bunch of tossers."

"If it bothers you-" Blackwall began, but she shook her head, interrupting him.

"No. When you say it, it means something different. It's nice," Aelis told him, and then brushed onward before he could form a reply out of his surprise. She stood. "We'd best get back before Cassandra thinks I've scarpered and sends a search party."

The sun was starting to dip lower in the sky, ducking behind the tower walls and casting the overgrown courtyard in shadow. Blackwall stood and followed her out of the ruin. They found the path quickly and were soon back at the main track, the sounds of the camp in the distance and the glow of its fire peaking through the sheltering trees.

He turned to look at Aelis, pausing reluctantly as she composed herself once more. In the gloaming light, her scars were nearly hidden against the paleness of her face. Her story had moved him, gripping him inside in a way he could not begin to explain. That she had opened up to him, made herself vulnerable to potential scorn, touched him most of all. That was not a small thing for someone with secrets and shame. And, if she were not the Herald and if he were not a murderer faking his way through life as a counterfeit Grey Warden, then he could have made something of those few moments there in the ruin. And Blackwall knew that, from the way she had looked at him there before they had set off back to the camp, in that moment she would have let him.

But, there was no use in wishing for the world to be any different than it was. Wishing wouldn't close the Breach in the sky or resolve the terrible war between the mages and Templars or make him any less a scoundrel. After seeing her fight and watching her work, Blackwall was certain that the Inquisition already had what it needed to get the job done right there in the form of Aelis, whether she really was a holy messenger from Andraste or just a stubborn woman with a sword willing to stand in the way of danger. And it could so easily go wrong. The harder the battles became, the more that doubt and anger would whisper in her ear.

It wasn't enough to believe in the Herald. Aelis didn't put her faith in the Maker or holy saviors, and pressing that title on her would only drive her away and make her feel cornered by the weight of expectation. Alone, she would fall prey to the beast within like a dragon eating its own tail, no matter how strong or clever she was. If that happened, there was no end to the ruin she could cause the Inquisition and she would likely destroy herself in the bargain. But with the right support, with the right guidance, there was no end to the amount of good she could do as well. Redemption for her, redemption for the world, and - maybe - redemption of a sort for him, too.

To get there, someone needed to believe in Aelis for her own sake and Blackwall concluded that it might as well be him. Her other companions were either too absorbed in their own troubles or too blind to see what he could see all too clearly. Both of them were soldiers - she seemed most comfortable around other warriors - and they already had a rapport. He'd been in her position before, and she clearly trusted him, so he might be the only one she would listen to. And, he wanted to help her. For her, for the Inquisition, and for himself. Twice in his life he had been offered the chance for something better, and twice he had failed. Maybe he could find some peace by offering the same chance to Aelis. It was what the real Blackwall would have done. Underneath her growling, scowling public face, he had caught a glimpsed what was left of the little girl who had wanted to be a hero, and it broke his heart to think of that going to waste.

"I enjoyed the walk, my lady," Blackwall told her, as the chorus of night insects gained in strength. Since she had afforded him the privilege of addressing her by that title, he felt it only right to use it. Aelis turned to look at him and smiled in the twilight.

"Did you? We'll have to do it again sometime, then," she replied. She stepped towards him then, her hand brushing his shoulder and lingering for just a moment before she turned back to the camp. "Good night, Blackwall."

He watched her go, his feet practically rooted to the spot. She usually addressed him as "Warden" and it was the first time she had called him by name. And it was the first time she had truly, purposefully touched him outside of their regular sparring matches. The light pressure of her hand on his shoulder had affected him with the gravity of a warhammer and he couldn't think clearly, except to notice the sway in her hips for the first time as she disappeared around the bend in the trail.

Shaking his head to try and clear the impure thoughts that followed, Blackwall hurried up the trail after her. Cassandra and Varric were already sitting around the fire, the dwarf spinning some tall tale about the antics of the Champion of Kirkwall to the wide-eyed scouts. Aelis had paused at the edge of the circle, listening, but Blackwall ducked into his tent. He didn't need any more fuel for that fire tonight.

Stripping down to his tunic and breeches, he let himself flop onto his back on his bedroll, breathing a sigh of relief to be out of his armor and laying down at last. He listened to the chatter beyond the canvas walls. A laugh rippled through the camp. He could pick out Aelis' voice like the sound of a Chantry bell mixed in with the others and he closed his eyes, tracing in his mind the way her chin would tip back when she laughed, angling gracefully with her neck, the line of which would continue down towards her shoulders and the contour of her breasts. Almost immediately, he had to force his mind to other things to avoid the pent up and slightly painful reaction of his body to those images, wincing and shifting uncomfortably.

"She's nearly half your age, you filthy old lecher," he mumbled at himself, but appetites would not be denied. Not when he could hear her out there and call to mind the way she had looked at him him this evening, and the way she teased and smiled. Not when he could remember the feel of her hand on his shoulder.

 _This might not be as easy as I'd thought_ , Blackwall admitted to himself in the darkness of the tent.


	3. Act II: The Knight of Sacrifice

_So, I posted this chapter yesterday and it seems like it got garbled somehow (thought it wasn't garbled for me when I posted it, which is weird; FF is doing some strange stuff for me lately). I just now noticed it, so reposting the proper version and hopefully this works._

 _Thanks so much to those who have left reviews so far. Sometimes my prose is a bit stilted, so I'm working on smoothing it out and making it flow a little better, and it's always nice to know that I'm improving. :)_

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 _It becomes an emperor to die standing. ~ Titus Flavius Vespasian_

The wind howled through the valley, moaning through the dark pines and rocky crevices and snapping at the tent canvases. The air was thick with snow as it blundered steadily downward from a black and murky night sky. Braziers and makeshift campfires kept the worst of the chill at bay, but the cold was steadily encroaching and there was less warmth than there were people who needed it.

Exhausted, his body hurting in more places than he felt should have been possible, Blackwall found an empty spot in one of the hastily erected shelters and lowered himself gingerly down onto a pallet, trying not to wake others who were sleeping or trying unsuccessfully to sleep. It felt like the first time he had been off of his feet in an age, but he didn't dare take his boots off. They were keeping him warm and who knew when he might have to be on the move again.

It had been nearly a day since the attack and the catastrophic destruction of Haven. As if the situation wasn't already dire, a blizzard had set in and the remnants of the Inquisition had had to scramble to find shelter in a nearby valley. It was impossible to determine where they were and how far to the nearest civilization until the storm abated. At least the snow made it harder for the enemy, if there was anything left of the unbannered army that had assaulted them, to locate the camp. Supplies were scarce, however, and they had lost an uncounted number of people in the battle. The survivors were frightened and restless, the uncertainty of their situation and the strained resources already beginning to cause fractures in the ranks.

Blackwall told himself not to think about it. They had to take it an hour at the time right now. Survive the storm, then regroup, then come up with a new plan. The healers had patched him up as best they could, but they couldn't remove the weary ache of muscles pushed beyond endurance or put the blood he had lost back into his body. He couldn't remember the last time he had slept. There was work still to be done, but he would be no good to anyone soon if he didn't at least attempt to rest. Making sure that his sword was within easy arm's reach and wincing at the protests of his body, Blackwall leaned back and stretched out on the makeshift bedroll. But, sleep would not come.

The attack on Haven had been one of the most terrifying battles Blackwall had ever fought. The rebel mages were unhinged, tainted with magic the likes of which he could never have imagined in his darkest nightmares. They attacked the front ranks like a wave of vengeful malice incarnate and Blackwall recalled the horrific sight of thousands of lights covering the valley, torches and magefire illuminating the immensity of their foe. He had known then in his heart that they were lost. Even with Haven's fortifications well underway, there was no way the small fighting force - even bolstered by the Templars - could defend itself against such unequal odds. But there was nothing else to be done. Better to die fighting than submit to slaughter. And it would have been a slaughter, if not for Aelis.

 _Aelis_. There was no doubt in anyone's mind now that she was dead, buried under half a mountain's worth of ice and debris. If the dragon had not killed her then the final avalanche that had buried the village certainly had. No one could have survived that. She had sacrificed herself to buy time for the rest of the Inquisition to escape to safety, and there was not one of the ragged survivors who didn't know and feel her loss. Their Herald. Their savior. The only hope they had of closing the Breach and restoring sanity. She was gone, and the world felt ashen and destitute for it. And the darkness was closing in.

He should have been there with her at the end. Thinking about it now hurt Blackwall more deeply than any of the wounds he had suffered. Even if he couldn't have saved her, at least she wouldn't have spent her final moments alone. And he would not now have to bear the unbearable shame and regret of having left her behind. _Like a coward_. It bit him to the very core of his being and he cringed under the heavy weight of despair and loss.

She had known it was a suicide she was going to. Before he had even heard the plan, standing at a distance and watching her conferring urgently with Cullen and the mortally wounded Chancellor Roderick, he had seen the realization in her face: the stilling of her expression, the indescribable change behind her eyes as her focus shifted from survival to calculating how many of the bastards she could take down with her. He had seen that look before on too many other faces to mistake it for anything else.

As the others had left her side to go see to the evacuation of the chantry, as Aelis had begun to prepare herself - checking and tightening the straps of her armor, binding up the wounds she already had, going through the ritual of calming herself and blotting out the instinctive animal fear of death that fell on everyone before a fight - Blackwall had approached her.

 _It doesn't have to be you_ , he had told her, willing to take her place at whatever end she was about to go to. He would have done so, gladly. She was younger than him. She had more potential, more to live for. If she survived, she had more of a chance to make something of herself. He had seen her come so far and fight so hard to be what she needed to be to the Inquisition. He couldn't let her throw that away. It couldn't be for nothing.

 _If not me, then who?,_ Aelis had replied. She wouldn't look him in the eyes as she shouldered her sword, but she had shaken her head at the ground, frowning. _It's a small price, Blackwall. The Inquisition needs the rest of them more than it needs me. I might not be a chevalier or a Templar or a Warden, but I can fight like one. I can die like one. I can buy these people enough time to save themselves and show those bastards out there how the bloody Herald of sodding Andraste dies._

The determination in her face, despite the pain and weariness behind it, told him that she would insist on this and that it was fruitless to argue. She had set her mind to it. And so Blackwall, his heart thumping hollowly beneath his breastplate, had made the only decision that felt right. He would go with her. He would not let her face what was out there alone. If he died, then he could think of no better cause and no better company for it. It was what a real Warden would have done. She had argued with him, urged him to go with the others, but he had held fast until she relented. Thinking of it now - of the way she had looked at him there in the nave of the Chantry, of the way she had seemed to want to push him away to safety and cling to him for comfort at the same time - made the sense of loss he felt for her now sharpen and burn him from within.

Until that moment, he hadn't realized that he was in love with her. He had enjoyed her company, admired her for her fierce tenacity and desire to better herself, worried about her when she was in danger, and tried to be a friend to her. She had been attractive to him, perhaps because of all her rough edges rather than in spite of them. Like any red-blooded man in the privacy of his cot at night, he had entertained notions, but he had always thought it merely a game between them. Something to pass the time and knock the edges off of the strain they were all under. Another time, another place, and so on. Looking at her there in the dark foyer of the Chantry - realizing that it might be the last time he would see her this way - Blackwall had known then with a hurt deep in his heart that it was love he was feeling. And it was love reflecting back in her face and voice as she urged him to save himself. Remembering it now, with her gone forever, jerked tears into his eyes there on his pallet in the tent with the wind moaning through the encampment like a funeral mourner.

It had been a long time since Blackwall had loved anyone, if he truly ever had. In his youth, he had chased a string of women, everything from whores to tavern girls to daughters of high society. He'd had a gift for it, having learned enough courtly manner to make a wench feel like a lady and enough rough talk to titillate a lady into feeling like a wench. Some of them he'd fancied himself in love with at the time, but never for very long. They had only been an anodyne to his vanity, an entertainment to fill the hours around his work, and a means to drown out the part of him that remained unhappy. He couldn't even remember their names, though he had left more than one ruined reputation and broken heart behind him. There had always been something more he wanted - some prettier woman, some more thrilling chase.

It had been years since he had so much as touched a woman - he didn't deserve that comfort and he had stuck to the wilderness and the backwaters for a long while besides - but it wasn't just that he had fancied her. He'd spent the last few weeks almost constantly in her company, tromping around Ferelden and fighting side-by-side with her. Aelis had become a part of his life, like the air or the sun rising, integral and familiar before he had even realized it was happening. It wasn't just him, either. For all of her scowling disdain of the noble upbringing she could not hide, for all of the hardness and hurt in her past that made her irascible and aloof at times, she had had a strange charisma that made people take notice. She had galvanized respect and loyalty from the people around her - soldiers, servants, and nobles alike. Even Cassandra, with whom she had forged an instant and deeply entrenched rivalry, had recognized it. If she had lived, Aelis would have taken history by the throat and changed everything, Blackwall had no doubt. If she had lived.

He should never have turned his back on her in that fight. The memory of it, the cacophonous and angry roar of voices and armor and weapons colliding, filled his brain and he shut his eyes against it so tightly he saw starbursts on the inside of his eyelids. He could still smell his own blood and the acrid, lightning-strike odor of magical energies. His inner eye was illuminated by the flash and flare of magefire. A spear had ripped through his plated brigandine and cut a channel across his ribs and it burned and bled with every heartbeat, but it had been one of many other pains and his body had fought onwards on determination alone. They had been right at the cusp of victory - he, Iron Bull, and Dorian guarding Aelis' back long enough for her to aim the trebuchet that would bring down a final deadly hail on the enemy. And that was when the dragon appeared, blackened and raging and terrifying, swooping out of the smoke and darkness like a nightmare incarnate.

 _Run,_ Aelis had screamed at them as she turned to bolt away from the wooden siege weapon and the beast's maw, and they had all obeyed. Blackwall could remember the flash of her pale face through the oculars of her helm, illuminated by the hateful light of the burning town and smeered with blood around wide, frightened eyes. The dragon's roar was deafening in their ears, the beat of its wings overhead like a rushing vortex of air dragging them back to their doom. Blackwall had pelted between the ruined buildings and palisade walls like a horde of demons were after him, Dorian's and Iron Bull's retreating backs pounding along in front of him and Aelis fast behind. They had not stopped until, lungs bursting, they reached the hidden path Chancellor Roderick had indicated and it was then that Blackwall noticed, his heart dropping into his stomach, that Aelis was not with them after all.

Somewhere outside the tent, a woman was crying. Not loudly, but in soft, aching sobs. Blackwall could hear her, as well as the low words of comfort someone was murmuring to her. So many people had died. Soldiers and civilians alike. There was no one who hadn't lost a relative or a friend or a close comrade in the siege. He shifted onto his side, pressed a thick arm over his face and ear to block out the sounds of sorrow. For the first time in a long while - not since he had held the real Warden Blackwall, dying, in his arms - he wanted to weep himself, for his own losses, for his continuing failures, but he would not wake those who had managed to find a short respite in sleep. And so he breathed in deeply and back out, and clenched his jaw so that no grief could escape his lips.

Someone had triggered the trebuchet that had started that final avalanche. It could only have been Aelis. Stubborn and defiant to the last, she had had her victory, even if it had killed her. It had taken Iron Bull and Dorian both to keep Blackwall from running back to find her before the ground-rumbling sheet of snow and ice had been loosed to devastate everything in its path. If he had managed to escape their grasp, he would have been buried right along with the town.

 _You're no good to anyone dead_ , Iron Bull had shouted at him, wrestling him back. But it would have been better if he were the dead one. It should have been him and not Aelis. The world made no sense otherwise.

Reluctantly, in the end, he had followed his comrades to rejoin the rest of the survivors. All three of them had been burned, cut, and bloodied nearly beyond recognition, but all hands were needed to get the civilians to safety and then the storm had set in. There had been no time to mourn. And so it crept upon him now, the reality that his friend, his comrade in arms, the woman that he had come to care for, was gone. He would never see her again. He hadn't saved her.

 _She was supposed to have been holy and chosen. She was supposed to be the Herald of Andraste_ , Blackwall thought, anguished and suddenly angry. He wasn't sure if it was a prayer or just a rhetorical cry into the echoing recesses of his own darkened soul. _This is the best the Maker can do?_ Religion had never been an interest to him, and Blackwall had always been something of a skeptic, but he had wanted to believe in the Maker. He had wanted to believe there was a divine plan in all of this. And he had wanted to believe in _her_ , even if Aelis didn't believe it. Too many things about her, about the stories that were told about her, fit into place. What good was the damned Chantry and their Chant of Light and the bloody Maker if people like Aelis - people who meant something, who could change the world and make it better - were buried in the end anyway?

Sleep was not going to come. Not tonight. Blackwall sat up and rubbed his face with his hands. A raised voice somewhere outside pricked his ears. There was a flurry of movement, the sound of armored footsteps muffled by snow. Quickly, still aching, he pulled himself upright and grabbed his swordbelt. Though the soul seemed to have gone out of the Inquisition along with Aelis, the body muddled on. Their unknown enemy could fall upon them at any moment. He would stay and do his best to help. Aelis would have wanted that, and he could not do less than she had done. Having cheated death once again, he felt more and more that he was living on borrowed time anyway.

The chill wind felt like needles of ice on his face as he stepped back out into the churned up slush of the main walkway between the tents. A crowd had converged near the edge of camp, and he could hear the agitated hum of too many voices. It didn't seem like danger was afoot, but Blackwall started towards the gathering anyway, cautious. It was then that the crowd parted and he saw the figure of Cullen hurry through, flanked by soldiers who gently pushed the onlookers away to give the general room to pass. The ex-Templar carried something in his arms - a body, from the shape - and a prickling sensation began in Blackwall's spine and spread to the back of his scalp. The hair on his arms and neck rose. A loll of the limp figure's head, a flash of red hair and white scarred face, nearly blue with cold and rimefrost, confirmed it.

"She's alive!" a woman shouted, breaking from the crowd and running through the camp. "Praise Andraste! The Herald has returned!"

The world stop turning. Blackwall gaped, his breath frozen in his lungs, his sword slipping from his fingers unnoticed to land int the snow, as he watched Cullen disappear into the healers' tent with Aelis in arms. He didn't know how it was possible. He didn't care how it was possible. A miracle needed no explanation. _She's alive,_ he thought, his heart filling to bursting with relief - relief that made him want to break down and weep there in the snow even more than the sharp grief of her loss he had experienced just moments ago had. _She's alive._


	4. Act III: The Knight of Roses

_So much of Blackwall's romance arc is doom and gloom. I wanted to explore, even if briefly, what some happy moments between them might look like._

* * *

 _There are people in this world so hungry that God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread. ~Mahatma Gandhi_

Though Blackwall was used to an active life and staying too long in the fortress never sat well with him, coming home to Skyhold was always blessed relief. The sight of the castle's sturdy walls and towers, even the snow that blanketed the rooftops and peaks, bolstered his spirits after spending so long in the punishing desert of western Orlais. After a very near brush with death on a failed expedition in his youth, he'd sworn never to set foot to sand again. However, it was an oath he was willing to break for Aelis. His lady required his assistance and he was happy to oblige her, not least because it meant he could assure himself of her safety in person and avoid pining after her absence.

His lady. Blackwall stole a glance sideways at Aelis, who seemed equally weary and just as relieved to be home as they crossed the causeway and rode through the gates and into the courtyard. The journey had been long and a good meal, clean clothes, and a bath wouldn't go amiss for both of them, but he loved to look at her in any condition. The times when she chose to ride out without him were few and far between, but he was never easy until he could see her in the flesh once more, grinning as she sidled up to him in the quiet shadows of the barn to curl into his arms like one of the hardy cats that kept him company in her absence. Nothing was certain for a soldier, but everyone needed someone to look out for them on occasion - even a great striding dreadnaught of a woman like Aelis, fierce beauty that she was - and no one had as good a reason to protect her as he had.

It had been more than two month now since he had tried to end it. After the heartwrenching trip to the Storm Coast, where he had failed once again at telling the truth, he had gone to her and nearly begged her to put an end to what he was feeling once and for all. She could no longer afford the distraction. He could not afford to let her get closer to the disaster that was his real life than she already had. He was so far beneath her that nothing good could ever come of letting those feelings continue further, and yet one look into those sea-grey eyes and he was lost. And, it had been more than a month now since she had refused, sealing his fate with a kiss and settling herself so deeply into his heart that he could do nothing but surrender. It would turn out to be a mistake; he knew this. But what a glorious mistake. A mistake he could make over and over again every day that he woke up and remembered that she loved him, and that he loved her.

The horses' hooves clattered across the old stones and gravel as the returning party mustered in the stable yard. Blackwall winced and stretched his sore knees stiffly as he dismounted amid the milieu of stablehands and soldiers. Aelis jolted down on her heels a few feet away, and paused to scratch the neck and ears of her solid chestnut warhorse affectionately, smiling and murmuring to the creature before a groom led it away. Like anyone who had ever ridden cavalry, she understood that the bond between horse and rider was just as important as between comrades on foot, but Aelis had a fondness for animals that Blackwall found both endearing and unexpected, given her growly nature. It was all too easy to see her as a near-mythic figure sometimes - even for him - and watching her take a moment to dote on her horse or play with one of the castle's dogs humanized her and reminded him that she was, behind the shadow of the Inquisitor and beneath her fearsome exterior, a young woman much like any other in the most important ways.

Aelis caught him staring then and her lips tipped up knowingly at him her for a moment, an eyebrow raising in acknowledgement before she turned away again Tired, sweaty, and smelling of horse and dirt, with sand still sifting around in their boots and clothes after more than a week of travel, she could still make his heart flutter in his chest just with that smile. Blackwall felt his cheeks straining and even blushing as he fought back his own smile, and turned to see to his mount, running a hand over the dappled grey's smooth neck and loosening its girth.

They had agreed to keep their involvement a secret for the time being so as not to cause a fuss or raise speculation, which meant that they had to be careful around prying eyes. It was easier to arrange to be alone at the castle, but the recent desert campaign had been hard-fought and the moments they could steal together were few and shorter than they would have liked. Another reason to celebrate the home-coming. Barring unforeseen circumstances, tonight would be the first evening he and Aelis would have all to themselves in quite awhile.

As the column broke up and Aelis was pulled away to brief her council of advisors on their progress in the Approach, Blackwall led his horse back to its stall and saw to its care himself. It was a practice that he'd gotten used to over the last few years. The work soothed him as much as it did the horse and gave him time to wind down from a day of traveling. He wanted to be at his best tonight, without the fears and troubles of the desert on his mind.

The mission had been troubling in more ways than he could count. The problems with the Grey Wardens and their Calling and the demon army they were supposedly raising was a mess beyond anything he could have fathomed, horrific in its details and implications as surely as it was dangerous and inconvenient to his ongoing deception. Questions had already arisen - was he experiencing the Calling like all the other Wardens? What were his brothers in arms thinking? - and he'd deflected them well enough for the time being. Warden Stroud hadn't batted an eye or contradicted him, so either he was good enough at the lie now to fool even a real Warden or the man simply had too much else on his mind to notice any errors. It had kept his teeth on edge to be certain, though.

That was a problem for later, however. Right now, it was enough to be still alive and back home. He'd join Iron Bull and Sera in the tavern for a hot meal once he was clean enough to be presentable. The elf girl could easily wolf down a half dozen bowls of stew after a long march, though she remained as bone thin as ever, and he had a running bet with Iron Bull that predicted at least seven bowls and a pie. They were good company, Sera and Iron Bull, though the Qunari was too perceptive for Blackwall's liking. It would be good to catch up with Varric and perhaps even that daft apostate Solas after having been gone for so long. Aelis would no doubt have to attend to her councillors and whatever noble stuff-shirts were on hand, but they had already agreed to meet in her chambers later when she could get away. The anticipation of being able to touch her again and take his time about it - as well as the thought of kissing her properly and well instead of just quickly before someone could blunder up and catch them - roused the electric appetite that made his spine shiver and his insides warm. That bath might have to be a cold one.

Later, the tavern was loud and rowdy, as it always was when men had returned from the field. Blackwall let the myriad voices and the bard's music wash over and around him amid the smells of beer, food, pipe smoke, and many bodies all together in the same place. It faded the desert and its problems from his mind as surely as the thoughts of what awaited him later did. He drank his ale and shared stories and jokes about the mission - with interjected commentary and chatter from Sera, of course - while he picked up the latest news from Varric and Iron Bull and the others.

The Empress' grand ball in the Winter Palace would be coming up soon. The Inquisition had been afforded an invitation to attend after all. _Nest of vipers_ , he could already hear Aelis snort, but she'd go all the same. And that might be even more dangerous than the desert had been, since she wasn't the type to be well acquainted with Orlais' Great Game. It was, perhaps, the first time ever that he had actually hoped she would take the pompous Grand Enchanter with her on a mission. No one was as suited to help her navigate the cutthroat Orlesian nobility as Madame Vivienne de Fer, much as Blackwall loathed the woman personally.

With his hunger sated and the world feeling like a friendlier place after a couple of mugs of ale, Blackwall pushed his chair back and announced that he was going to turn in early and get some decent sleep after a month of laying his head in the sand. His friends raised a final glass to him to bid him goodnight and then fell back to chatting among themselves. He stopped by the bar on his way out to ask for a bottle of sweet wine for the road. Aelis held her ale or whiskey as well as anyone, but tonight felt special and he wanted to bring her something better than the usual tavern stock.

A few people lingered in the great hall, lesser nobles and other officials of the Inquisition deep in conversation, but they paid Blackwall no mind as he crossed the floor to the entrance to the Inquisitor's tower. Aelis often preferred to work from the warm and well-lit solar in her quarters, and so it was not unusual for her companions to call on her there. No one would think anything of Blackwall attending her, even at this time of the evening, and that was what they were both banking on. His heartbeat skipped as he mounted the stairs, disturbing the ravens that roosted in the unfinished body of the tower, and rapped upon her door.

There was a momentary silence and then the sound of footsteps padding on stone before the door opened and Aelis' face appeared around it, haloed by a nimbus of slightly damp red hair. Her cheeks still had a rosy glow from scrubbing to them and the smell of soap reached Blackwall's nose. Evidently, she had just finished washing and that knowledge sent his thoughts immediately to what he might have seen if he had been a few minutes prompter. As it was, she grinned at him and opened the door fully, revealing herself to be clothed in a soft knee-length tunic. She fixed him with a dramatic expression, eyes widening in mock dismay, with her hands on her hips.

"What's this? A brigand at my door? And me fresh from my bath and barely decent!"

Maker, they had only been at this for a short time and she already knew exactly how to wind him up. Silhouetted there in the doorway, without the usual bulk of her armor and thick clothing, it was harder to keep his eyes on her face instead of boorishly imagining what she looked like under that light shift, and she knew it. Unable to staunch a grin of his own, he followed her into her chamber. Her eyes sparkled mirth as she closed the door behind him and leaned back against it.

"Now, I hope you're not bent on mischief, sir," she teased, her voice taking on a deeper and more arch tone that made his nerves thrill as she prolonged the joke.

Unable to stop himself, and not wanting to besides, Blackwall laid a hand against the rough wood of the door behind her and slid his free hand under the curtain of her hair to caress her neck where it was most sensitive. Her skin was warm and her body reacted to the touch exactly as he had known it would. He could still scarcely believe that she would allow this, but the soft breath that escaped her parting lips was evidence enough that it was more than mere permission she was giving. He leaned closer, pinning her between him and the door, playing the lewd intruder to her innocent maiden as she wanted him to.

"If the lady requires mischief, I'm sure I could oblige," he rumbled near her ear, though it was difficult to maintain his concentration when her body was pressed against him so. She kissed him then, deeply and sincerely and for what seemed to be both a long moment and no time at all to Blackwall. Her bare arms wrapped around him and, when the kiss was done, she leaned her head against his shoulder, exhaling a sigh that sounded like relief and satisfaction. Weeks had passed without him being able to hold her like this, and Blackwall savored the feel of her body relaxing completely beneath his fingers and the smell of her hair and skin.

"I've missed this," she murmured into his neck and then threaded her fingers into his, squeezing his hand as she stepped back, smiling, and pulled him further into the room.

Her chamber was in one of the taller towers, but comfortably furnished and graced with two balconies and banks of large windows through which the snowy vista of the Frostbacks was visible under a star-strewn sky. A fire was crackling in the large hearth already, warming the room and providing enough light to comfortably see by. Aelis moved to the settee before the hearth, pausing to take two goblets from a side table. Blackwall broke the wax seal and gripped the cork of the wine bottle, easing it out and filling the cups before accepting one himself.

"We're fancy tonight," Aelis remarked playfully as she rolled the wine around in the goblet. "Can't open a new bottle without marking the occasion. What should we toast to?"

"Home? Good company?" he suggested, sitting down close to her. He smiled, eying her figure suggestively. "Good wine and beautiful women?"

"Ha! You _are_ out for mischief tonight," laughed Aelis, though delighted, as she shifted into a more comfortable position. It was the first time he could recall seeing her bare legs, the strong calves arching in pleasant curves up to her knees and an inch or two of well-turned thigh before the rest was cloaked by her tunic. He wanted to run his hand up those curves, trace her knee, and perhaps further up as well, but the evening was young yet. No need to rush. Aelis raised her glass. "Well, to all of it then. To home-coming, to good company, to fine wine, beautiful women, and also this particular bearded bloke that I've taken a fancy to. May we never lack for any of it."

Blackwall could drink to that sentiment and did so, raising his glass along with hers. The wine was decent, sweet on the tongue with a pleasant fiery undertaste and a hint of honey. Not Orlesian, but not bad for a Ferelden vintage. The preliminaries out of the way, he allowed himself to relax into the comfortable seat, an arm curling around Aelis' shoulders as she moved to be close to him.

Life really didn't get much better, with a pleasant room and a fire, the heady kick of the wine and the woman he loved a warm and alluring presence beside him. It was perfect, and though allowing himself this comfort instead of his usual lonely asceticism aroused his guilt and a habitual undercurrent of unease, Blackwall could put that aside briefly simply to appreciate the rare moment of peace in a world that had grown increasingly difficult of late.

"I wish it could always be like this," Aelis sighed after a long and comfortable silence, her eyes closed, her face smooth and untroubled. "No Corypheus. No Breach. No one trying to get me to sort out every damned problem under the sun. No sneaking around because the truth might offend someone. Just you and me in front of a fire and everything as it should be."

The sentiment warmed him - that she wanted him, that she could envision a life with him in it - but it pricked at him all the same because he knew that, even without the danger looming over the world, he could never give her that. A life with him would be equally problematic, just for different reasons. Blackwall shifted a little, his hand rubbing the bare flesh of her upper arm. He didn't want to think about that now. Not on such a pleasant night.

"You don't think you'd find it dull after all this excitement?" he asked, and she snorted a laugh.

"If this is excitement, I can understand why you'd want to spend most of your life wandering around the countryside trying to scare up recruits and staying out of everyone else's way," she replied. Aelis drew back a little bit then, sipping her wine, and then stretched her neck to one side and the other, wincing sorely. "Who knows. Maybe when this is all done, I'll join up myself. I've no intention of being some holy figurehead forever, and I can't imagine there's going to be much use for an Inquisitor after the Chantry is sorted out. Joining the Wardens might be the safest bet if I wanted to quietly take a bow and disappear. If there are any Wardens left after all this business with the demons and the Calling."

Blackwall felt his chest tighten with the mention of the Wardens and he looked at Aelis. Her brow had knit, though her eyes had the faraway look that meant she was thinking about something that troubled her. He moved his hand up to her neck, rubbing the tense muscles there and she sighed, closing her eyes and letting her chin fall forward.

"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it," he told her, trying to deflect the conversation away from dangerous territory as he kneaded the knots from her necked and set his cup aside to move on to her shoulders. She turned, presenting her shoulderblades, and he sank his fingers into the thick muscles around them, hearing her moan softly as she arched her back. As he worked on her, she turned her head a little to glance back at him.

"Is it hard being a Warden? I've heard the stories, I've read the bits and pieces we've picked up along the way. The way Stroud talks sometimes makes it sound like a terrible burden. I know it can't be easy, but is it really as bad as all that?"

"It's a necessary duty. And an honor," Blackwall told her, remembering with discomfort the words that Warden Blackwall had spoken to him all those years ago. It didn't feel like such a lie if what he was saying was actually true, just not a truth he'd experienced himself. "It's hard, but you go into knowing that it's hard and that it's worth it in the end if it keeps the world safe from Blight and Darkspawn. It's a worthy sacrifice."

The room was silent for a moment, save for the crackle of the fireplace. Aelis was still, pondering, as Blackwall worked at the tension in her back, his large hands moving further down, rubbing large circles into the stiff flesh near her lower spine.

"You don't like to talk about it, I know," she began again and then hesitated. She took a deep breath. "But, I was thinking about what Stroud said about the Calling and . . . what happens. How all the Orlesian Wardens are having the nightmares and hearing awful things in their head. I know you said you weren't afraid of it, but I don't like to think of that happening to you and not being able to do anything about it. You'd tell me if it was that bad? So I could find a way to help?"

"I'm not going anywhere," Blackwall assured her, firmly, though he could feel his heart sinking deeper under the weight of another lie. "I swore to see this through and that's what I'm going to do."

He should have told her the truth that day up on the sea cliffs and had done with it. If there was anyone who would understand, with her background, it was Aelis. But the way she had looked at him that day under the dripping trees among the ruins of his old life - all that hope in her eyes, all that willingness to believe the best of him - had left him speechless. He hadn't been able to disappoint her, and after that it was too late. He kept having to spin the lie deeper and tighter around them, and he hated it. But what else could he do? He couldn't bear to hurt her with the truth now. And he felt too much for her at this point to lose her.

Aelis nodded and then stretched, her arms bending and then extending, her waist twisting as her back arched. She turned, gathering her knees up under her as she faced him so that she was just above eye level, and ran her fingers into his beard in the way she did sometimes when she wanted to make him smile, tweaking it with affection as she leaned her forehead against his.

"Whatever happens, it won't change this," she told him, softly, and then kissed his forehead, nose, and finally lips. Her breath was soft on his cheek and Blackwall closed his eyes, giving in to the strength of the feelings she evoked from him and also to the shame. She hovered there, her palms against his cheeks, offering him comfort that he didn't deserve. "I don't care how long we have, as long as I can spend it all with you."

He kissed her back, his heart swelling with love and pain at the same time, and pulled her into his lap as he did, wrapping his arms around her. She gripped him in return with vigor. Never all that demonstrative with anyone else, Aelis seemed to make up for that when they were together in private. The way she melted into his arms, the way she seemed to abandon all other thoughts when they were with each other like this, never failed to melt him, too. There was nothing about her that didn't intoxicate him, from the taste of the sweet wine on her lips to the way her body curved and fit against his own so perfectly to the way his skin thrilled and heated and cooled under her hands like a bar of iron being worked in a forge.

The animal mechanics of it were easy enough. He'd had enough women to know how these things went, but it was different with Aelis. She was in some strange way _more_ than those previous encounters had been. She teased him and excited him to lust, sometimes beyond what he was sure he could endure, but there was something pure about his want for her even so, something that dwarfed Thom Rainier's conquests and made them seem faded and tawdry now in a different and more intense light.

His body ached and groaned with that want even now. The embrace had taken on a deeper fervor. With his lips pressed against her neck, he could feel Aelis' pulse quicken and the way her fingers dug into his own shoulders and back through his tunic as her breath came quick and gasping against his hair. It would be so easy to simply stand now and carry her to the big bed, riding that feeling into sweet ecstasy as he took her there in the flickering shadows of the firelight. She would let him; he could feel the want radiating through her skin. After so long in the desert, with the pleasant buzz of the wine in their veins and the heady relief of being alive and home again, it would be such a perfect and needed release. He raked his fingers into her hair, kissing the underside of her jaw fiercely as he pressed his straining erection up against the noticeable heat between her legs, nearly resolved to do it.

Never had there been a better opportunity, the part of his mind that was still inhabited by Thom Rainier urged him. And that was exactly why, he realized, drawing back suddenly and sucking in a deep breath of air, that he could not do it. Not like this.

"You always pull back," Aelis murmurred when she had caught her breath. There was a tremble in her voice but she didn't sound angry. Her hands were splayed across his chest like a breastplate, and he could feel each of her fingertips pressing down through his tunic. The touch did nothing to soothe the raging cauldron of desire in Blackwall's belly and the faintly painful pressure that was building below it. He kept his eyes closed, concentrating on his breathing for a moment, before answering.

"It's not the right time," he told her, and then added, thinking quickly, "There's your virtue to think of, for one thing."

She snorted a laugh, and he could hear the incredulity in it without looking at her face. He leaned his head back back on the settee, turning his face up to the rafters to breathe more deeply and gather his composure.

"Alright, then, maybe there's _my_ virtue to think of."

She giggled faintly at the joke, thank the Maker, and then gently tugged at the end of his beard, drawing Blackwall's chin back down and making him look at her. She was still warm on his lap, her eyes bright with desire, but also with love and some concern. She tilted her head to one side, raising an eyebrow.

"Mother Giselle's not going to jump out of the woodwork and lecture us about propriety, you know. And it's not like how we feel about each other is a mystery at this point." She wriggled very slightly, making a point about his obvious physical response to her sitting astride him and sending a fresh wave of heat up through Blackwall's body. He writhed a little, a grumbling growl of both pleasure and frustration escaping his throat. "It _is_ alright to want this. If that's what you want."

"I just want to do right by you," he told her, realizing as he said it that it was absolutely true. He stroked his fingers through her hair, taking in the way it fell around her shoulders when it hung loose and how his heart stirred and yearned when he looked at her and saw her look back the same way. It was the cleanest pain he had ever known. "I haven't always lived the way I should or been the man I should have been. You deserve the best and nothing less than that. There's nothing in this world that I want more than you, but I won't give you something to regret."

She smiled slightly at that, and then sighed. "You are far too hard on yourself, my broody-bearded Warden."

Her use of the false title stung him, but he could not show it. _Not nearly hard enough by a long shot_ , he thought. _If you only knew._ He let his hands run down her back rest on her hips and tried to smile back.

"When I'm half as good as I need to be, we'll talk," he told her, and she chuckled, slipping off of his lap and going to refill their goblets. His body felt cold from her absence already, despite the heat of the hearth.

"When the right moment comes, then." She held his cup out to him before sipping her own, glancing at him over the rim. "But don't think I'm not going to devil you unmercifully in the meantime until you change your mind. I may not have many feminine wiles, but I've got one or two stored away and they're pointed right at you."

"I am, as always, at your mercy, my lady," he acquiesced and, Maker, _that_ was the honest truth. She resumed her seat next to him on the settee, curling back against him comfortably.

"Josephine tells me we've a grand ball to attend. I don't suppose I could convince you to be my escort?"

"Well, that depends," Blackwall replied, trying to lighten the conversation again. The wine was stronger than he'd thought, and he enjoyed the haziness of it in the back of his head and the expanding glow of the flames in the fireplace. "What's in it for me?"

"Oh ho, now that's a different tune than a few minutes ago," Aelis chortled, picking up the joke. She grinned. "My undying affection isn't enough? What about the chance to see Iron Bull try to squeeze himself into an actual shirt then? I'll be beset by a horde of tedious masked prigs who have nothing better to do than scheme and out pompous each other between dances. Totally outnumbered and surrounded. Death by a thousand cutting remarks imminent. You wouldn't leave me to such a cruel fate, would you?"

"Well, if we're talking about a damsel in distress, I supposed I could do it for a kiss," Blackwall considered, stroking his chin thoughtfully, playing along.

"My hero!" she declared, feigning a swoon across his lap that set them both to laughing as the pleasant haziness of the wine took over.

The rest of the evening proceeded smoothly, all troubles temporarily forgotten in the face of each other's company and the silliness brought on by being slightly drunk. As the hour grew late, Blackwall took his leave, though reluctantly. Aelis would have had him stay the night, and Maker knew how that he would have preferred to bed down in the warm darkness of her chamber with his arms around her rather than in the hay of the stable loft, but the last thing they needed was to raise speculation and it was better if he wasn't found in her bed by some chambermaid when morning came. He kissed her once more, hugging her close and enjoying the last moment of bliss. She leaned her face against his chest briefly, and sighed.

"Promise me that one day, if we make it through, that I won't have to see you off like this again," she murmured, her voice low and drowsy. The tenderness of it, uncharacteristic for Aelis, tugged at his heart, even as the innocent futility of the request hurt him hard and deep. As likely as not, that day would never come, whether they survived or not. He just couldn't tell her why.

"I can't make you a promise I might not be able to keep," he told her, leaning his head back against hers and steeling himself for another lie. "Your duties will go on after Corypheus is dead. So will mine."

He heard her exhale a sharp, low laugh, though he couldn't see her face. "You're so damned inconveniently honorable sometimes. I envy that about you."

She withdrew a little from the embrace, her arms still around his shoulders, and smiled. "You know the right thing to do, and you do it. Even the things that hurt. If there is a Maker, sometimes I think you're the one He actually meant to send, not me. I didn't believe in heroes anymore until you came along. And you're the one who thinks you're not good enough for me."

The words caught him like a spearhead to the heart. She released him, with a final brush of her hands and last goodnight, and then he stood in the dim light of the tower outside of her chamber, staring at the closed oak door.

It was an impossible situation _._ The heaviness in his heart closed back around Blackwall as he descended the stairs. _Hero._ He couldn't tell her the truth. And he couldn't continue to lie to her, not when she took the lie so much to heart. Not when the man she was falling ever more in love with was someone else, someone Blackwall was only pretending to be. She wanted a man like Warden Blackwall had been - someone who had been decent and honest and honorable and not a murderous, lying bastard. She deserved a man like that, but he could only play at being that man. And the time was drawing ever closer to hand when he would either be exposed or the depth of the lie would grow to be such a burden that he would have to expose himself to put an end to the agony or leave. The thought of leaving her now felt like severing his own sword arm.

 _Maker_ , he thought as he exited the great hall into the cold night air, sorely grieved when he had been in paradise only an hour before, _what am I going to do?_


	5. Act IV: The Knight of Dawn

_This is a shortish chapter because even though I love writing angsty hurt/comfort stories and Blackwall is a great male love interest for that, writing this and the next chapter just Biowared my poor heart right to pieces. Also, does anyone else think it's weird that Blackwall doesn't really get an "I love you" scene like most of the rest of the romances? Fixed that. In the saddest way possible._

* * *

 _Hell is yourself and the only redemption is when a person puts himself aside to feel deeply for another person. ~ Tennessee Williams_

Nighttime was never quiet in Skyhold. The murmur and shuffle of horses down in the stables below, the dull metallic clanks and gruff exchanges of guards about their patrols, and the distant laughter of late night revelers at the tavern was ever-present. A working fortress never slept, though Blackwall usually did, aided by a nightcap of ale or wine to take the edge off of the day. Not lately, though. And, especially, not tonight.

Aelis lay curled against him, naked, on the straw and furs of his makeshift bed in the barn loft. She slept on fitfully despite the distant reminders of castle life, her breasts rising and falling ever so slightly against his arm. The moon was waxing towards fullness outside tonight, casting a ghostly glow in from the eaves and the barn's hatchway, highlighting the shapes of supple thigh and hip and edging the smooth arcs of her arm and shoulder with silver. Her red hair, usually bound up at the nape of neck, was loose and mussed, throbbing crimson in the chimerical light and standing out against her pale skin.

It was the first time that he had seen her this way. Her body was scrawled here and there with livid scars, just as his was. Testimonies of the violence of their lives and of a ferocious capacity for survival. Some men would have thought her a ruined beauty for those scars, but Blackwall didn't care. Aelis wore them like an Orlesian noblewoman wore jewels, unselfconsciously and as a statement of her worth, and he loved that in her. He loved _her_ , entirely. More, now, than he could bear to.

He had never meant it to come this far, though rarely had there been a night over the preceding few months when he had not wanted it - ached for the release of it, even. She would have taken him to her bed or come to his gladly before now, but he had balked, unable to reconcile his feelings for her with the lie he was living. And the lie had only grown since then, squatting in his mind, reminding him that this could never last. That, in the end, it would destroy him one day. And that day had now come.

It had all started as an innocent flirtation back in Haven. A game. Thom Rainier had both relished and excelled at that sort of game once upon a time. He had tried to stop it when it became obvious that the game was becoming a reality, but it had been too late by then. His heart had been hers long before he had ever so much as kissed her.

Before he had fallen in love with her, he had wanted only to help her. There had been something broken and lost in her there in the early days at Haven; she had needed someone to believe in her, and he had wanted to be that someone. It had seemed such a small thing, and the change in her after that, the way she had put aside her feud with Cassandra almost entirely and focused herself intently on doing right by the people who looked up to her, had been gratifying to see.

If he had known then that she would become the Inquisitor - if he had known how she would twine herself up in his heartstrings before he even realized what was happening - would he have acted differently? Blackwall wanted to say yes. He wanted to believe that he would have done what was necessary to prevent the pain that was now inevitable. In his heart, though, he knew that, given the chance to go back and decide differently, he would only have fallen in love with her again. Another weakness to add to what was already on his conscience.

Compared to her, he was nothing. Less than nothing. A murderer, a traitor, a liar. In his heart of hearts, a coward. And Aelis was the Inquisitor, whether holy and chosen or an accidental victim of chance, risking her life in service of a Maker she didn't even believe in and for people to whom she had no real obligation. She might scoff at her own noble heritage, she might have darkness in her past, but it was her courage in the face of despair and the nobility of spirit in her that others responded to and which had drawn him to her like a moth to a flame. And she loved him. It scarcely seemed real.

And, of course, it wasn't. If she knew him for what he truly was - not the stalwart and righteous Warden Blackwall she had fallen in love with, but corrupt and monstrous Thom Rainier - she would likely hate him. She would hate herself for falling prey to the lie. Once upon a time, she might have understood; she might have been able to forgive him the lie and keep his secret as a friend and comrade, if not a lover. But it had gone too far for that now. Her trust was never given lightly. She would never forgive him for violating it so completely.

But, then, perhaps she never needed to find out. For months now, he had managed to keep the charade going, despite being directly under the nose of one of the best spymasters on the continent. Aelis herself never asked the really inconvenient questions. She - like so many who respected the Wardens - had never given his title a second thought. His crimes were so far in the past now that as long as he played his cards right and avoided old acquaintances, it was likely that he could live out the rest of his days in Skyhold at Aelis' side without anyone being the wiser. The thought of staying in service to the Inquisition, of allowing himself to sleep each night beside this woman as her paramour, allowing himself to be loved by her, awoke a clawing need in him as strong as a starving man being shown a banquet that he would never be able to consume.

Because, of course, Blackwall was supposed to be a Warden, with responsibilities elsewhere and the looming threat of an untimely death in the Deep Roads. He could thank Stroud, Maker rest the man's doomed soul, for enlightening them all about that. It troubled Aelis, though she did not mention it often. She knew that one day he would no longer be able to bear whatever it was the Wardens experienced as their time wore down and the corruption began to overtake them at last. Her fear that she would lose him to the darkness under the earth one day, though it was based on a lie, was real. Even if it were true, she would have insisted on loving him anyway. She would have put a brave face on it and seen him through to the last. He admired that in her even as it made him loathe himself all the more for causing her unnecessary pain.

There was also the issue of Mornay's impending execution. The news had reached him as they passed through Val Royeaux on their way back from the Approach like a bolt of judgement from the Maker himself. Mornay. How long had it been since he'd seen the man, his former lieutenant and second in command? Mornay had been a good second, a good soldier. He'd been as loyal a friend as Thom Rainier had ever had. The man had really believed in the Empire, despite its flaws, and that was was why, on that cold dawn, he and the others had executed their orders perfectly, though they had all heard the voices of the children in the carriage.

Blackwall knew that he had failed Mornay and the other men under his command in the most heinous of ways possible. They had trusted him, and he had led them to their own ruin and deaths for nothing more than gold and his own craven pride. Now, it was Aelis who trusted him. It was Aelis who thought him a hero, while the last man who had trusted him awaited execution perhaps a hundred miles away. It wasn't right. It was grotesque. The man he wanted to be, the man that Aelis loved, would not stand by and let others pay for his own mistakes, even at this late date. He couldn't save the others, most were now long dead, but he could save Mornay. He'd lose his own life in the bargain, as the uncompromising hand of justice tightened around his throat at last, but that would almost be a relief at this point compared to continuing on as he had, never knowing when the truth would catch up to him.

Aelis sighed and shifted a little, her fingers curling on the dark mat of Blackwall's chest hair as her cheek settled further against his shoulder. The night was chilly and, unconsciously, she snuggled closer for warmth. Awake, she was fierce and vibrant, a tower of strength. The tough mercenary braggadocio had never really left her, though she had walked out of that life and into something better. Tonight, naked in his arms, was the most vulnerable he had ever seen her. He brushed a wisp of hair from her face and felt the heat of frustrated shame suffusing him.

He hadn't realized that she was a virgin until the moment, groaning with the urgency of his need and her desire, he had mounted her there on the straw and furs and felt the brief resistance and give, her body tightening and her breath gasping out against his shoulder as he breached her. She had spent years fighting in the hells of the Orlesian civil war, and he had assumed that, like most soldiers, she had taken what comfort she could along the way. But, no. He had frozen there, still buried inside of her, and seen the truth of it in her eyes without needing to ask.

Everything had changed in that instant. He had loved her before, but the knowledge that she had - for whatever reason, and he would now never be able to ask her - kept herself through years of war and pain and the uncertainty of a violent death forever close at hand and then given herself up to him there in a stable loft as if he were worthy of something that pure humbled him in a way that nothing else in his life ever had. _Don't stop_ , she had whispered, kissing him, assuring him that it was alright. And so he hadn't. He had given her everything he had to give, body and soul - the best of himself, though it was not nearly enough. And it was then that he had known, with crushing certainty, that he could not stay.

Even if Aelis never found out the truth about him, even if he could extend the lie out for the rest of his life in order to be with her, he owed her more than that. She deserved better. She deserved a man like the real Blackwall, who did the right thing, who sacrificed his own self-interest in service to others. Aelis believed unquestioningly in the goodness in him and would not be swayed. She was wrong, but he could still - even now - prove her at least half-right. He could face the music and accept the justice that was due. It was a cruel joke of fate that he would lose Aelis anyway, but his suffering would be short. Hers, though, when she found out . . .

Blackwall had left it as late as he could. Mornay was set to be executed in a matter of days, and he would have to leave before daylight tonight if he were going to make it to Val Royeaux in time to stop it. His leaving would hurt Aelis, but she was going to be hurt anyway no matter what he did. If he left tonight, before she could question it, there would be less to explain. With her fears about the Calling, she would assume that his time had finally come and he had not wanted to spoil their last night together. Let her hold Warden Blackwall - who had deserved a woman like her - in her memory as a good man who had loved her for as long as he was able. And let Thom Rainier go to a hangman's noose unloved and unmourned, as he deserved.

Gently, he eased himself carefully from her arms and stood. Moving slowly to avoid unnecessary noise, he gathered his clothes and dressed in the chilly moonlight. His gear was already in a state of readiness down below, as it always was. Outside, the indifferent stars drifted indolently in a lightening sky. Another cold dawn was no more than an hour or two away, and the day of judgement was at hand.

He felt in his belt pouch until his hand closed around the familiar pitted metal of the real Blackwall's Warden-Constable badge. His heart seized, remembering the touch of Aelis' hands on his and the hope in her eyes when they had found it. He withdrew the talisman from his pouch, bit his lip hard with sorrow, and then crossed the loft floor to where she lay, still sleeping.

Maker, she was beautiful. He stared down at her, drinking in this last sight of her - he could allow himself that, at least - and then knelt. He placed the badge where he had lain on the furs next to her. It would further implicate the Deep Roads as his destination, for there was no reason a Warden would leave it behind unless he did not intend to come back. She could keep it to remember him by or fling it from the ramparts in fury or grief, which ever would let her move forward from this.

He reached out, brushing her cheek and neck with his fingers, his regret a palpable bitter taste in his mouth.

"I'm sorry," he whispered, unable to stop himself from saying the words that he desperately wanted her to hear. "Forgive me."

His voice roused her very slightly, and for an instant he was afraid she would waken. His breath caught, but her eyes did not open.

"I love you," she murmured, drowsily, and hearing it broke his heart as sharply as anything ever had. They had never actually exchanged those words out loud before now. The timing had never seemed right. And, yet, she held him so deeply in her heart that she could tell him so even in her sleep. She would not remember when she woke, but he wanted to tell her now, at this last possible moment.

"I love you, too."

The corner of her lip tipped up very slightly, though her breathing had slowed and settled again, and he rose shaking. A moment longer, and he would falter under the weight of his fear and his love for her. Not this time. This time, he would _be_ good. He would _be_ the man she believed him to be. Pretending was no longer enough.


	6. Interlude: The Angel of Truth

_The course of true love never did run smooth. ~William Shakespeare_

The smaller training yard, situated in the crook of curtain wall and keep in Skyhold's lower ward, was normally the quietest and least used of the fortress' public spaces. Being further from the barracks, few of the soldiers frequented it and it often became an extra paddock for the nearby stables or a welcome patch of sunny ground for the kitcheners to sit in as they shelled peas and plucked chickens for the night's meal. This afternoon, though, the yard was occupied and word soon got around the castle that it was better to steer clear for the day. The Inquisitor had arrived back from Val Royeaux at midday and, from the hard and constant sounds of a training sword thwacking and thumping against a wooden dummy, she was not in the mood to be disturbed.

Aelis was not aware of being avoided. She had scarcely been aware of anything but the storm of thoughts swarming through her brain like a chaotic and maddening cloud of midges since leaving Blackwall's cell in the bastille of Val Royeaux. There was work to be done. There was strategy to be discussed and letters to write and people who needed her attention - the whole bloody world seemed to need her attention - but all she had wanted to do throughout the tense negotiations in Val Royeaux and the silent, uncomfortable ride back to Skyhold was hit something and then continue hitting it until she either felt better or felt nothing at all. Better it be the dummy than an actual person, and so she trained and sweated and cursed the state of her shieldwork under her breath.

 _Why?_ It was the question Aelis kept coming back to. She didn't begrudge Blackwall - _no,_ she corrected herself bitterly, _Rainier_ \- the initial lie. It was one thing to lie to a stranger, someone who couldn't yet be trusted, but the time since they had been strangers was long since gone. He had been her friend - her mentor, even, in those dark days before the attack on Haven - and for some months now he had been her lover and closest confident. Beyond her advisors, beyond any of her other companions, she had trusted him the most. She had looked up to him. And, damn it, she had let herself love him. He had seemed so good, so immovably and unshakably bent on doing the right thing and being the hero that she herself had always wanted to be, that she had let her death-grip on her own heart slip, and that made it all the worse now.

How could he have let her lay herself open to him, in so many ways, while hiding the awful truth from her all the while? How could he have not trusted her? If he had told her, she would have understood. It would have been hard to hear, but she was no better than he was. She had once been the Mornay to Farrell's Rainier, following orders that she was too afraid to disobey and giving those orders to others. The parallels both sickened and tormented her, dragging up memories that she had long since tried to bury.

~~0~~

 _Two dozen people huddle around the central well of their smouldering hamlet, terrified of the soldiers who surround them now just as they had been terrified of the soldiers who had demanded their hospitality at the blade of a sword the week before. The old men sit motionless, defeated. They know what's coming. The women try to comfort their children. A baby squalls, refusing to be comforted._

Do it _, the commander orders his lieutenant, a bored tone in his voice. These people mean nothing to him beyond the coin he was paid to punish them for harboring the enemies of some noble lord. They're one more tedious job on his itinerary._

There are children, sir _, she replies, uncertainly. Two of them are staring at her now from where they crouch behind the flimsy protection of their mother's arms, twin boys with wide dark eyes._

So there are _, the commander replies, unmoved, but testy now that his orders are being questioned._ Get on with it. Daylight's wasting _._

Sir, _the lieutenant protests, turning to face the older soldier plaintively, but the commander is in no mood to be challenged. He glowers at her. A dangerous expression. An expression that heralds pain and punishment, especially since the other soldiers are taking notice of the disagreement now. She's walking a thin line, but she can't believe that he means it. Executing the captured soldiers had been one thing, even if they had been disarmed and defenseless. The village men, those who had fought back against the mercenaries, had given her no choice but to kill them. The elderly, the women, and the children are a step too far, even for Farrell._

Another word, Milady, and you can join them _, the commander growls out. It's not an idle threat. They left an archer in a field for the crows to pick over not a week before for trying to desert mid-contract, his back shredded to the bone from the leaded cat before blood loss took him. She feels her heart pounding in her chest, her lungs burning. She's killed before, hundreds of times by now, but never like this. The rest of the company is staring at her, watching, waiting. The villagers are waiting, too, breathless, their faces white with dread._

Take them to the barn _, she shouts, finally, turning to the men that are under her command. Her heart feels like it is about to burst from her throat and fly away. She stopped singing the Chant of Light long ago, but she prays now - a desperate voice in her mind that pleads for this not to be happening, that begs the Maker to change her commander's mind since she cannot._

 _The people weep and plead and struggle as the soldiers herd and drag them down the main road to the largest hay barn that is still standing and secure them inside, jamming the doors shut. It's early autumn. The rafters are stuffed with grain and straw for the winter. A torch is prepared, but before the sergeant can heft it up, the commander intervenes. The lieutenant's heart leaps with relief, thinking that he's changed his mind, that even Farrell can't be as inhuman as this - until he hands the torch to her and nods to the loft. This is her punishment for defying him, even momentarily, it dawns on her. His eyes glint at her, satisfied with the horror written on her face, the mind behind them as dark and cold as the Void. She knows then, at last, that nothing is beyond Farrell._

 _She grips the torch, feeling sickened in the deepest recesses of her being. And because it is either the people in the barn or her, and because she knows that the people in the barn are already as good as dead anyway, she turns and hurls it with all of her strength. It sails through the square opening of the loft hatchway and lands deep inside. Within minutes, the entire loft is in flames. The people below pound and scratch against the wooden walls, wailing to the Maker, to anyone, for help._

There is no Maker, the lieutenant thinks, numbly, standing back from the heat of the blaze as the first of the screams begin in earnest. There is no one who can help these people. And now there is no one who can help her either.

I told you I'd toughen you up _, her commander tells her, clapping her on the back with a nasty grin before walking away._

~~0~~

With a loud crack, the arm bar of the training dummy splintered under her training waster, and Aelis glared at it furiously, lungs pumping and huffing from exertion and emotion, her lips twisted in anger and her eyes stinging.

 _We'll regret this, my lady,_ she remembered Blackwall saying after that first wonderful, yearned for kiss, his grey eyes fixing her with a look of grief that she hadn't understood then and which she now understands all too well.

"You wonder if they felt the same way you did," a voice said, perfectly completing her thought, from somewhere above her and Aelis did not have to look up to know who it was that was perched in the gnarled oak tree. "Orders growled out hard and low. The faces and places are different, but the command is the same. _Do it._ They trusted him. You trusted him. He gave the order, and you followed your orders. Rainier, Farrell. Mornay, Milady. For you, the faces all become the same."

"Get out of my head, Cole," Aelis ground out, the words coming out as a tense snarl as she bit back the urge to whirl on him. Her teeth clenched together so hard that she heard the cartilage in her jaw crack.

The slim figure of the spirit-boy dropped lightly from the tree branch, spindly arms and scarecrow figure landing with preternatural balance, his wide-brimmed hat flopping. Aelis closed her eyes. She didn't want to look into his freaky, froggish face. She didn't want see how he peered through her, prying into places that hurt her as acutely and precisely as a field surgeon digging arrowheads out of her flesh. Her sword hand gripped the hilt of the waster, her shield arm made a knuckle-whitening fist.

"You thought that being near his goodness meant that you could learn to be good, too. That's why it hurts. He thought the same thing about you."

"Cole. _Stop_ ," Aelis gasped, feeling the muscles of her torso ache and contract as if with actual physical pain, making her want to curl in on herself in an attempt to block out the words. Her breath hissed, " _please_."

There was a silence and then she heard the boy's oversized feet shift away. He paused.

"Milady died at Haven. Rainier died by the sea. The faces don't belong to them anymore. The lie does not mean that you are less. Not to him." And then, he was gone, in his unsettling way. She couldn't remember seeing him leave, but Aelis blinked and then she was looking at thin air.

She drew a ragged breath and then wiped the sleeve of her padded gambeson furiously across her face to remove the burning sweat and dirt and threatening tears from her eyes before shaking her shoulders out and forcing out the deep exhalation in order to keep her blood moving. Aelis craned her neck to each side and scuffed her feet in the dirt. _Don't think about it_ , she told herself as she tried to square back up with the splintered dummy. _He doesn't know what he's saying. Who knows what he even is, if not a demon sent to plague us with his creepy, unwanted eavesdropping._

But Cole did know what he was saying. And Aelis did think about it. And the training dummy died a hundred more deaths before she could bring herself to breathe easier again.

The sun's rays were starting to slant over the battlements, the shadows lengthening along the ground. Her back and legs were sore from riding. Her arms were sore from training. Her mouth was dry from thirst; all she could taste was the salt of her own sweat and it tasted of anger and anguish. But, she wasn't ready to stop. Not yet. Not until she had made a decision. Not until she had bled off the last of her hurt onto the training field so that she could face the others without flinching. Aelis did not want to face them at all, but she had to. She would do it right. If the Inquisition failed, it would not be because she had failed them.

 _And I won't give Cassandra the satisfaction_ , Aelis thought to herself, her mouth tightening in bitter disdain, even as she knew it was unfair of her to think this. Her relationship with the Seeker had mellowed slightly after Haven - they had a common goal that they both cared about now, and so they had learned to work together - but there would always be tension. Aelis privately suspected that Cassandra would always consider her a godless thug, while she would probably always see the Seeker as a fanatical bully. And the situation with Rainier had brought the old resentments to an ugly head once more.

 _You have options. You can intervene, if you wish,_ Cullen had told her once they were all assembled in the war room again. Cassandra was in attendance, though she rarely involved herself directly with the planning these days out of a sense of deference for Aelis' position. The Seeker could not argue with her results, but it was better if they did not clash over methods and reasoning and it would do no one any good to give the appearance of undermining Aelis' authority. Perhaps Cassandra sensed what was about to happen. Perhaps she felt that no one else would have the courage to say what needed to be said to Aelis' face. Perhaps, as Aelis tended to believe, she simply wanted to rub it in. A criminal falling for a criminal. Two peas in a pod.

 _Leave him be, Inquisitor,_ Cassandra had insisted. _Let Orlais take care of its own problems. We have more important matters to attend to._ Her sharp, imperious Nevarran face and dark eyes had fixed on Aelis like the deadly points of arrows being drawn at her heart. Remembering, Aelis felt the hairs on her neck bristle and the muscles in her back clench like the arching yoke of a cat.

It had not gone well. The argument had ended with Aelis slamming her fist into the war room table and roaring, _He would do the same for me. If you had ever loved anyone other than your damned Maker, you would understand._

It had been a long time now since Aelis had lost control of her temper like that. It brought back foul and haunted memories. She could feel the spectre of Milady still stalking underneath her skin, as if she were a demon-ridden mage. Her horror and revulsion of hearing that tone in her own voice again made her check herself sharply and she had stormed away before she could do any further damage. That was why she was here now, beating a training dummy to kindling, working the beast in her into exhaustion.

 _He would do the same for me_. Would he? Even as she questioned it, she knew that it was true. Blackwall - Rainier - had never failed her before now. He had risked his life for her more than once. He had gone out of his way to help her, as well as a legion of other people they had come across in their travels. He had stayed behind to die with her at Haven, when all hope was lost. If it was all a ruse, then Blackwall was a master manipulator more deft than Vivienne could ever aspire to be. If the tables were turned, he would not walk away and leave her to her fate. He had wanted so much to believe in redemption; that alone she knew to be absolutely true. Whatever she had done, whether she deserved it or not, he would have tried to save her.

The heavy sound of footsteps and the creaking of leather approached, and Aelis turned from her thoughts to see the hulking, horned figure of Iron Bull standing at the edge of the field. He had two double-handed wooden training swords balanced on one shoulder and a waterskin in the other hand. He nodded his large head at her and raised the skin.

"Hey, Boss. You look like you could use this."

Aelis stared at him. She wanted to refuse, to send him away. She didn't want to talk to Iron Bull any more than she had wanted to talk to Cole. But, her body clamored for the water, and need won out in the end. Grudgingly, she leaned her training waster against what was left of the dummy and took the waterskin from Iron Bull as he neared her, balancing its pendulous, kidney-shaped body along her elbow as she pulled the stopper and drank.

"Not bad," the enormous Qunari mercenary observed, surveying the broken dummy with a critical eye and then glancing at the shield on her arm. "Mixing up your fighting game a little. Smart. You never know what's going to be on hand when a rumble goes down."

"We're short a shieldman now," Aelis replied, cautiously, eying her friend warily.

On the whole, she liked Iron Bull. He was fun to drink with. He was fun to fight with. He was imminently useful, as were his Chargers, and he had saved her hide more than once. But, she would never fully trust him. Besides the fact that he was an acknowledged spy and - she could admit this - smart enough to perpetually be a step or two ahead of her at nearly every turn, he was a mercenary of the best devils-may-care, ends-justify-the-means sort and she had spent a good amount of effort leaving that life behind her. He seemed to understand this without her explaining and did not take offense. He was nothing like her old commander had been. If she had fallen in with an Iron Bull instead of a viper like Farrell, then her life would have been very different. Still.

Iron Bull lowered the long training swords from his shoulder and leaned on them, regarding her with a humorous twist of his angular face.

"And you figure you and Cassandra might do more damage to each other than the enemy if you brought her along instead. I get it."

Aelis shot him a look. "Heard about that, did you?" Well, of course, he had. He didn't have Cole's supernatural gift of insight, but close enough. And he had made himself familiar with practically every servant in the castle, so there wasn't much that happened in Skyhold that didn't get back to The Iron Bull sooner or later.

The Qunari shrugged. "When the Inquisitor yells at her advisors, word gets around."

"Bloody hell," Aelis muttered, shaking her head in frustration. In her fury, she hadn't thought about that. She _was_ getting it wrong. Bull interrupted her.

"Hey, don't worry about it, Boss. Happens to the best of us," he told her, cheerfully, as he stood upright and deftly flicked up one of the training swords to offer her the hilt. "While we're here, you asked me to teach you that Qunari disarm and coup technique a few days back. Seems like as good a time as any."

The air was turning cooler with the onset of evening, and Aelis felt the sweat on her skin becoming cold. A welcome relief after the heat of her exertion. She wiped her brow again, studying Iron Bull's oxish features and trying to detect what his game was. There was always a side game with Bull.

"Come on, there's only so long you can work over a pell before you need an opponent that will knock you back on your ass, right?" he cajoled, good-natured and grinning. For a moment, Aelis thought about refusing, but maybe he was right. It might take her mind off other things.

She took the sword, unstrapped her shield, and wrapped her palms around the wooden trainer to test its weight and balance. Despite her classical training in the days when her parents had expected to make a Templar of her, she had always preferred the solid heft of a two-hander or a bastard sword. _I suppose I just have a taste for bastards_ , she remarked dryly to herself without enjoying the joke as she squared up with Iron Bull.

"The trick is to use their own weight to wedge their weapon to one side as they come in on you. Then you catch the hilt and twist so that their momentum breaks their grip on the sword. Most of the time, you don't even have to sweep them. They put themselves down," the mercenary commander told her, "Come in slow like you're going to take my head and I'll show you."

Aelis obliged. With a pivot of his body and a twist of his shoulders, Iron Bull demonstrated the move, breaking her hold on the trainer and sending her stumbling a few steps before she could regain her balance.

"Follow it up with a low sweep to the joint of the knees while they're fumbling around, put them down, then drive the sword point down into their vitals to seal the deal, and it's over," Bull told her. He nodded. "Again. Then it's your turn."

The simplicity of the technique was deceptive. After she had gone through the sequence slowly several times to memorize the moves, Aelis' first combat speed attempt failed miserably. Bull simply powered in and trapped her blade against her own chest, shoving her back.

"Angle's off. You have to crook it away from your body a little, so their blade slides down yours."

She raised the trainer again and concentrated on achieving the correct angle this time. The mental exercise was, in fact, helping. She couldn't concentrate on the moves and stew about her problems at the same time. They circled each other, Iron Bull attacking and Aelis refining and adjusting her grasp of the technique each time.

"So," Iron Bull asked, as they were resetting for another attack, "what _are_ you going to do about Rainier?"

The surprise of the name after Aelis had refocused her attention to other things threw her off as he swung in and she overcompensated her block. The wooden sword rapped the top of her knuckles painfully and she shook out her hands, cursing.

"Andraste's flaming arse, Bull. Give me some damn warning next time," she sputtered, as he chuckled at her.

"You think those Red Templars are going to give you warning? Shake it off," he taunted back, pleasantly, amused. She scowled at him, though she knew he was right. She stretched her smarting fingers once more and then gripped the hilt of her trainer again. A thought struck her. She eyed the mercenary suspiciously.

"If you tell me that you knew about Rainier this the whole time, I swear to-"

"Nothing like that, Boss," the Qunari interjected, catching her drift. "Always knew he was hiding something, but nothing like this. Have to say, I'm impressed. It's not often someone gets one over on me like that."

Sullenly, Aelis nodded and shifted her shoulders, shaking the tension back out of them. It was hard to tell where Bull's loyalties lay sometimes, but she believed him. Especially now that he'd been ejected from the Qun. And if Bull hadn't known about Rainier, and if even Leliana had overlooked him when she had had all of the information right on her desk the whole time, then perhaps Aelis could cut herself some slack for having been fooled, too.

"So?" he pressed, as they re-engaged. "You going to try and spring him?"

"You tell me, Hissrad. You're the 'people person', after all. Should I?" she retorted testily, using his Qunari title to get a rise out of him. He gave no indication that he noticed it. She successfully repelled the attack this time, but faltered on the disarm. Bull never missed a step. They completed another circle. He was enjoying this, she could tell. The mercenary wagged his horned head in a gesture of consideration.

"Not my place to say whether you should," he observed. When he attacked again, she rode his blade down and hooked the guard, but she was too slow on the break. He deftly freed his sword before she could twist it free. "But, you'll get him out anyway. Harder next time. Pretend like you're going to take my arm off with it. This isn't one of those fancy Orlesian dances."

Aelis cursed under her breath, feeling her frustration starting to build again. On the next attack, she caught his sword, rode it down, and wrenched the guard over, landing the trainer in the dirt and pulling her larger opponent off guard.

"That's what I'm talking about," Iron Bull growled, triumphantly. "Faster. This time its for real."

He swiped up the trainer and swung at her again, hard.

"What do you mean 'you'll get him out anyway'?" Aelis demanded, grunting with effort as his sword met hers with a loud crack. She whirled with him, just barely managing to complete the disarm before he twisted away. Her follow up blow whizzed by inches from his knee as he evaded her, though, and he caught up his sword in hand with more agility than she would have thought possible for a Qunari of his size and kept moving.

"I know how you work. You don't leave your people behind. Rainier, whoever he is, is still one of us. So, you'll save him. I'm just curious about what you plan to do with him afterwards."

Aelis couldn't tell whether this was meant as a compliment or an accusation. Her direction to save the Chargers had cost Iron Bull both his culture and his homeland, though he had accepted this as a reasonable exchange. She hadn't been able to sacrifice Krem and the other soldiers, even with an alliance with the Qun and a boatload of Qunari sailors on the line. She didn't know the sailors - poor bastards - but she had shed blood and drank ale with the Chargers. She'd had the blood of too many good people on her hands already. And she could never have looked Iron Bull eye to eye again if she had forced him to watch them all die, his little family of misfits.

 _You don't leave your people behind._ As she thought about Rainier - imagining him sitting there in the dark dampness of his cell, waiting to die - she felt as if something within her was tearing, unbearably and agonizingly slowly, one seam at a time.

"Use that. Come on," Bull barked at her. He did not pull his shot at all this time. He was serious. The wooden sword made an evil sounding hiss as it arced towards her head and Aelis, her expression screwed up and her teeth bared in anger and pain, flung up her guard to meet it. There was a whirl, a wrist-wrenching twist, and a thump, and she found Iron Bull's back to her and her sword tip pressing into his neck. His trainer thudded to the ground a second later.

"There's a saying in the Qun," he told her, turning to face her. His tone was soft. Aelis felt her blood throbbing, her breath coming hard as she waited for his next move, every inch of her skin seeming to vibrate along with her heartbeat. Her anger had dissipated from her over the course of the exercise and the pain had dulled to an undercurrent, but her senses felt heightened, super-aware. Bull's expression was grave. " _Ath ashkost._ Seek peace in work. The Tamassrans and the trainers demanded the most from us when we were unhappy or angry. They said that those emotions were the sharpest stones to hone a blade on. And they were right. Sometimes, the work is all that gets you through."

Within the blink of an eye, before Aelis could even begin to respond, the Qunari had snatched the sword from her hand and swept her legs out from under her, landing her gasping on her back in the grass. The blunt sword point buried itself into the earth inches from her cheek. Iron Bull's silhouette loomed over her, an enormous shadow in the falling dusk, backlit by the bloody sky.

"Whatever you decide to do, Boss, never let yourself be miserable enough to find that perfect edge."

He reached a bulky grey hand down and Aelis clasped it, breathless and exhausted, letting him help her to her feet. The Iron Bull clapped her on the shoulder with a smile and a nod as if it were all just a normal sparring match on a normal day, and left her with the waterskin. Aelis watched him walk away, slinging the practice swords over his shoulder as he whistled at one of the passing kitchen girls. Her mind was, for once in the last several days, completely blank. Her body was at the end of its endurance. She was done for the day.

Slowly, sorely, she collected the waterskin, drank, and poured a small amount over her head to cool her face and neck. Her hair was already dark and locked with sweat and the water felt like a balm on her parched throat and skin. Torches were being lit in the guard towers. She could hear the bard starting up a rousing evening of performance at the tavern. Dinner would be ready soon. She would take her meal alone. It was too soon for company. Normally, she would slip down to the tavern or the barn afterwards, but it was sleep that she needed and there was nothing in the barn for her now anyway.

Gathering her belongings and the nearly empty waterskin, Aelis made her way slowly back towards the upper ward. The sparring match with Iron Bull had purged her. She felt like a patient awakening from a fever, light-headed and unsteady, but she was already thinking more clearly again. She would apologize to Cassandra, and also to her advisors, for her lapse of temper. She would make herself eat tonight and she would sleep. And tomorrow, she would start working on a way to rescue Rainier. Bull was right. After the wrenching horror of sacrificing Stroud in the Fade, she would never leave anyone behind again, justice and expediency be damned.

As she reached the top of the stone steps that wound up to the upper ward, she looked up to spot a familiar face highlighted in the flickering glow of the courtyard's torches. Commander Cullen, who had been standing near the front steps of the keep, deep in conversation with one of his captains, turned and spotted her almost immediately. Aelis stopped, waiting as he extricated himself and approached her.

He looked tired. The last few days had not been kind to him either, chasing after her and Rainier across half of Orlais. He had problems enough of his own - orchestrating a war, commanding an army of the faithful, dealing with the discomfort of his fading lyrium addiction - without taking on her problems, too. He was the last person she wanted to see her losing her grip, but at the same time she was glad that it had been Cullen and not one of the others who had been there to help her hold it together when she had come up from the depths of Ranier's prison cell.

"Inquisitor," he greeted her with typical politeness. He always seemed pleased to see her, but tonight there was hesitance, too. Aelis smiled, for his sake, to show him that she was no longer angry.

"Cullen. It's been a hell of a day, hasn't it?"

"Yes," he replied, returning her smile, relief evident. His look when shifty again. "Are you . . . feeling better?"

Her anger had vented at Cassandra and not at him, but Aelis knew that it must have been unsettling all the same. She shrugged.

"I'll live. I need to drop these off at the armory," she told him, indicating the waster and borrowed shield. "Care for a walk?"

He agreed, apparently glad for the excuse, and they moved away from the lights of the main courtyard. She had always liked Cullen. He had a better sense of humor than most Templars. Better sense in general, really. There was something sad in him even when he was in a good mood, but - with the worst of his lyrium withdrawals over with - it seemed to burden him less these days and she was glad for that. He was her friend, and he worked too hard and put so much of himself into his work. She worried about him, more than most of her comrades.

Of all of her advisors, Aelis knew Cullen the best. She was on good terms with Leliana, they had an understanding, but the spymaster was too hidden and mysterious for her to get close to. She liked Josephine and felt protective of her ambassador, but they had so little in common that it was a tame friendship. Josephine was a reminder of the sort of noble Aelis should have been, a mold she could never fit into anymore than Josephine could pick up a sword and go into battle. Aelis cared about them both and respected them for their talents, but the relationships would always be somewhat tentative.

Cullen was a warrior, however, like Aelis herself. They had a common interest in the martial resources of the Inquisition and common experiences on which to base their friendship. She understoond the struggles he faced and the sacrifices he had to make, and his resolve and capacity for leadership were traits that Aelis herself admired and strove to emulate. His good opinion of her - as a soldier, as an Inquisitor, and as a person - mattered, nearly as much as Blackwall's had mattered. If he was confident in her, then she could not be far wrong. And, having lost Blackwall, his was the moral compass that she trusted.

"For what it's worth, I'm sorry I caused a scene. I know Cassandra was only trying to help, in her way. I'll go eat my crow when I'm finished here," Aelis told the commander, once they were sufficiently alone. They walked slowly. There was nowhere to rush to.

A more genuine, relieved smile appeared this time and he chuckled. "She won't hold it against you. If I had a gold sovereign for every time Cassandra's shouted at someone, I could buy Ferelden." He continued more soberly, "She knows you're doing well. She's proud of what we've accomplished - what you've accomplished. You've exceeded her expectations."

"Well," Aelis replied, carefully, humbled by this admission, unsure if she really believed it, "it's not over yet. I've still got time to bollocks it all up." She sighed. "These Wardens, Cullen. I don't know."

He nodded, silently, thinking the same thoughts, no doubt. The siege of Adamant Fortress had been worse than she could have imagined. The image of the frightened and desperate Grey Wardens practically lining up to sacrifice themselves to blood magic in order to prevent the Blight from swallowing the world after they were all gone haunted her dreams. _It's not right to want to do good, to be good, and have it turned against you._ Rainier had said that. She shook her head.

"We'll sort it out. Hawke has gone to Weisshaupt to find out what's gone wrong with their commanders. I want the Wardens who came over to our side and the ones that survived at Adamant treated well in the meantime. I'm not going to be responsible for punishing them. Their lives are hard enough already."

"Agreed," Cullen concurred. He paused and then stopped. He looked at her, though his face was shadowed outside of the range of the torches. She couldn't read his expression. "About Rainier."

Aelis flinched, but she didn't turn away. Not now. She nodded, trying to acknowledge the subject gracefully. "I'm going to get him out. But, I won't risk the Inquisition's good name on it. We take care of our own, but it's personal between him and me. Whoever he is, whatever he's done, I owe it to my own peace of mind to save his life if I can. I just have to figure out how, and what happens after."

"Leliana and I were talking about that earlier, in fact," Cullen admitted, and then hesitated. "She has a plan, though I'm not sure you'll find it all that palatable."

Aelis listened, her expression turning to a serious frown as Cullen explained. She had known since the beginning that Leliana had put pressure on her old commander - Farrell, that devious snake - to keep his mouth shut regarding her involvement with his company. She hadn't realized that Leliana had put him and his Shieldbreakers on the Inquisition's payroll as part of the bargain. In addition to the Chargers, the Inquisition kept a few dozen small mercenary companies on retainer to handle less critical jobs here and there in places that it was harder for the Inquisition soldiers to reach. Farrell had a broad definition of what counted as mercenary work. She'd seen him work for long enough before she had left to know that he had connections to every underworld organization and underhanded business deal on the continent. No doubt, Aelis realized as she followed Cullen's line of thought, many of them leading back to the cutthroat nobility of Orlais.

Leliana, it seemed, had picked up a thread that might just work to get Rainier released, given the right leverage. A favor called in here, a bit of coin there, and Rainier could be turned over to "private parties" for justice rather than facing the gallows of imperial justice. Farrell's contacts were well-placed for such work. And, if discovered, it would not lead back to the Inquisition. Farrell would make damn sure his own reputation was clear, and so he'd be obliged to keep the Inquisition's name out of it as well.

Farrell. She should have known she hadn't heard the last from him. He'd get a laugh out of her asking for his help, Aelis knew, shifting uncomfortably at the thought. She could almost see his shrewd, weather-lined face grinning at her out of the dark corners of her mind, his gimlet grey eyes winking cold malice, his rough voice - damaged by a half-slit throat in his youth - growling out at her: _Blood or gold, Milady. Didn't I tell you everything costs in the end?_

Even thinking about him gave her the shivers still, even though Aelis knew that she was now out of his reach. And Farrell would do the job as long as he was paid well. He'd never turned down so much as a copper in all the six years she had served him. She hated the idea of having any further dealings with the man. After the violence of their parting, he might very well just have Rainier killed and dropped in a ditch out of spite. She knew the her old commander was imminently practical, though; he wouldn't risk angering the Inquisition. Leliana was more than a match for his scheming malevolence and she wouldn't have suggested the plan if she didn't believe the risk was minimal. If it worked, Rainier would be delivered back to Skyhold alive, safe from Orlesian law, and the Inquisition would be blameless. Aelis sucked in a breath.

"I'd rather cut my hands off than deal with that bastard ever again, but we don't really have any better choices. I'll pen the request myself and have Leliana send it in the morning. Perversely, it'll probably put him in a better mood if he knows I'm the one begging the favor personally."

"And when they bring Rainier here? What then?"

There was an odd quirk in Cullen's tone; something Aelis could not decipher. _What then?_ That _was_ the real question.

In her mind's eye, her thoughts ran back to Rainier in his cell, of the torturous pain in his voice as he named himself a monster, of the haunted brokenness in his face - the face of a man she had loved beyond anything she had ever really felt herself capable of - when he had slipped to his knees under the weight of his own self-condemnation and loathing. _Wouldn't you have been happier if you had never known the truth, if you had believed that the man you loved was a good man, an honorable man, not a monster?_

 _No,_ she thought, honestly, the answer surfacing in her mind with chilly clarity. _It doesn't work that way. The heart doesn't care whether it loves a monster or a saint. It loves anyway._ And it was no monster she had fallen in love with, just a man. A man with secrets and regrets and pain and fear. A man who got it wrong, sometimes horribly wrong, and tried to do it better the next. Just like her.

"Rainier's already punished himself worse than I ever could. An execution would be merciful in comparison to forcing him to live with himself," she told the Commander. "We'll go through the motions. I'll officially pardon him, just so there are no questions or loose ends. Josephine can spin a pretty story to the Orlesians about the mercy of Andraste, and they won't be able to pin anything on us directly anyway. Rainier will be a free man. If he chooses to stay with the Inquisition, then he can take up his old place again with no further questions asked and we can get back to business. If he chooses to go, then no one will stop him."

Cullen nodded, slowly, considering this. He reached up to smooth a hand across his short hair and down his neck, and paused. She could only see his outline in the gloaming, not his expression. Though they were friends, there was always that little bit of inhibition with Cullen, that hidden part of him that he always held back.

"Just be careful," he told her, finally, and sighed. "You know him best. I trust your judgement. But I would not see you hurt again."

The earnestness in those last words touched her. Aelis searched what she could see of his face, but could make out nothing. At last, she shrugged.

"Who knows. After all this trouble, he might be glad to be rid of me."

"If so, then he's a fool," Cullen replied, and then brushed onwards before she could formulate a response. "I should get back. I hope that he proves himself worthy of your faith in him. Just know that we're behind you. And you know where to find me, if you need me."

"Cullen," she called, an uncomfortable thought occurring to her, as he turned to go. He paused, his blond hair highlighted in the distant light from the courtyard. Half of his face was in shadow, but half was illuminated enough for her to see the pale scar on his cheek and lip and one wistful, hazel eye gazing back into her own. Through them, Aelis thought she caught a glimpse of what lay inside that hidden place, and she smiled out of a sense of bittersweet kinship. "Thank you."

He nodded an acknowledgement, and she watched him walk back towards the keep before quickly crossing the rest of the path to the armory, ducking inside to replace her equipment on the racks. There was a letter that needed writing. There were preparations that needed to be started. Now that the decision had been made, Aelis could refocus her attention to where it was needed and take comfort in action and work until Rainier arrived. She could not predict how he would respond, whether he would stay or walk away rather than bear up under the burden of his disgrace, and so she did not want to hope for anything beyond preventing his death. She did not even know if she _should_ hope for anything else. It would depend on what she found when she saw him again.

But she would believe in the good in him, as he had once believed in the good in her. And she would leave the door open. It would be up to Rainier to walk through it.


	7. Act V: The Knight of Ages

_Just one more chapter at this one, and it will be a shortish epilogue. Thank you so much to everyone who has read and commented on this piece. It always puts a smile on my face to know that someone enjoys my work, and I had a lot of fun writing this one._

* * *

 _To love another you have to undertake some fragment of their destiny. ~Pierre Corneille_

The great hall of Skyhold's keep was all but empty in the late hours, the low flicker of torches and gentle undulation of the hanging banners in the rafters the only movement to be seen. Dinner had finished hours before and most of the guests and the household had gone to their rest for the evening. A few guards stood by, and Blackwall felt their eyes on him as he entered and crossed the hall, the sound of his boots muffled by the thick carpets that had been brought in to cover the cold stone. It could do nothing to muffle the low thump of his own heartbeat in his ears, however, as he approached the empty throne.

Had it only been a day since he had last stood here in chains before the high seat of the Inquisition? It felt like something that had happened to him an age ago, or something from a nightmare long past still vividly recalled. He kept expecting to wake up, blood thrumming and breath gasping, back in his cell. When he had been rousted from the bowels of Val Royeaux' bastille, Blackwall had thought the end had finally come and he had welcomed it. His execution would have been deserved, his death the only currency he had to pay for the pain he had caused. Instead, he was hustled through the streets in the dead of night, loaded onto a horse, and drug back across plain and mountain to Skyhold, where Aelis - Inquisitor, holy Herald, abandoned lover - was waiting for him.

In the shadowy light of the hall, backlit by anemic moonlight through tall panels of stained glass, Blackwall paused before the throne, remembering. The bitter shock of seeing her again when he had been brought up from Skyhold's dungeon had turned his body leaden and shattered his composure into fragments of frustration and woe. Had the sight of him as a broken murderer in a dank cell and the knowledge that an execution certainly awaited him not been enough for Aelis? Had she simply want to be the one to send him to the Void personally, either out of a sense of responsibility or a desire for bloody vengeance? It was not what he had come to expect from her, but he had known that it was not beyond Aelis in her anger either.

From listening to their talk on the journey, he had learned that the men who had taken him from the city had been mercenaries from her old company. Criminals, scoundrels, more brigands than soldiers - their type was all too familiar from his life before he'd established himself in Orlais. That had been Aelis' life once, too, but he had thought her long since past it. That she would turn to them now - with him as the cause of it - when she had come so far and when there was so much now that depended on her was more than he could bear on top of everything else. He had not been able to stop himself from lashing out at her for it, though he had lost the right to chastise her for anything.

His brain sketched out the scene before him now in the empty hall: her there upon her throne, listening, as formidable as an Avvar warlord, as still as if she had been a statue carved from iron and granite, while he railed at her for selling her honor and giving him one more thing to regret. The thought of it made him burn inside with shame now and he almost turned back to flee to the barn and drown himself in ale until he did not have to think of it anymore - to, finally, disappear from her sight for good.

But, no. Aelis had forgiven him. When she had every right to leave him to the hangman or to take his head herself, she had bought his freedom and then pardoned him with Andraste's grace. She had given him his leave to go forth and do as he saw fit within the Inquisition or elsewhere. The shock of it had nearly sent him to his knees. He had wanted to die. He had wanted to have it all at an end. Aelis' mercy was crueler than any hangman could be, to force him to live with the knowledge of what he had done and as well as the scorn of the people who had once thought him good and whose respect he had craved most. And that, he had realized then, was true justice. Death would have been too easy.

There had been more. Fearing that it might be his only chance to say it - and able to have her believe him any kind of monster but never faithless to her - he had blurted out that his feelings for her had never been a lie. And, before the court, there before the Maker and everyone, she had acknowledged him as her paramour and kissed him, if only briefly. _We'll figure it out,_ he could still hear her say. _Together._

Blackwall was not blind to the politics of this. The kiss was a symbol to the Inquisition at large that the matter was closed and that he was not to be made a spectacle of at the risk of the Inquisitor's displeasure. It was an official seal on the matter, of sorts, but if there was actually a chance that Aelis herself, as just the woman - as just the woman he loved in the same way his body drew breath - could truly forgive him, he could not keep her waiting long.

The door that led to her chambers stood a dozen feet or so from the throne and Blackwall stared at it for a moment, collecting himself, and then approached. The guards did not stop him. They had, evidently, been instructed not to, as that was the only reason he could think of that they would let a recently revealed murderer and criminal anywhere near their liege. The door was unlocked and swung open with the smallest of creaks, the darkened stairway that lead up to the Inquisitor's tower rising beyond. How many nights had he climbed this tower with anticipation and joy in his heart? And now, fear. Blackwall could hear nothing inside save the flutter and beak-clacking of the ravens that lived in the unfinished tower as he disturbed their reverie. Aelis had declined to have the birds shooed away. She had named each of them, always fond of the castle's creatures. Perhaps that same affinity for beasts was why she had become fond of him also. Carefully, he shut the door behind him and began to mount the stairs.

The rest of that day had seemed to pass like a fever dream. His shackles had been removed. He had been free to walk the grounds of Skyhold again and take up residence in his place in the barn. Though Blackwall had received glares and overheard grumbled comments from more than one denizen of the castle as he passed by, if Master Dennet knew about his now infamous fall from grace, the horsemaster didn't let on. Dennet had time only for his charges and anyone with a strong back and a gentle enough hand to help him care for them. Blackwall fit those criteria well enough, and so the stable welcomed him back. He had put himself to work, letting the stress and strain of the body anesthetize the mind until he could bear to think about it again.

A sliver of light escaped through the crack around the door at the top of the stairs. The door itself was slightly ajar, enough that he could see the shiver of firelight on the walls. The mountains were cold and snowy at this altitude almost all year long, and so there was hardly a night that could be passed comfortably without a fire in the hearth. So much of their time together had been spent here, or around his make-shift hearth in the stables. Memories of the first time he had kissed her, both the struggle for control and the glorious surrender, rose up into his thoughts like the sun-lit silver flash of a fish in a stream and he felt suddenly flushed, his nerves electrified, his breath catching.

 _You're a good man_ , he could still remember Aelis murmuring to him that night, soothing him. He had wanted that to be true more than he had wanted anything in his life. More than Young Thom had wanted to win the Grand Tourney so many, many years ago now. More than Captain Rainier had wanted any of the women or the respect or the prestige he had won in Orlais. More than he had wanted the gold for which he had ruined himself, even. What would she say to him now, when she knew the truth? Did she remember those words with shame and embarrassment at how easily she had been fooled? He reached for the door handle and steeled himself to find out. Aelis had left it ajar for a reason. She was expecting him.

She had come down to the barn last night after everything was over with. He had been sitting beside his fire, alone, exhausted from the ordeal of the day, and had heard a creak from the direction of the stables. When he had looked, Aelis was there leaning in the doorway, regarding him. Since they had taken up together, she had liked to visit him in the tavern or in the privacy of the barn after dark each day to steal an hour or two in his company. It made her days as the Inquisitor more bearable, she said, if she could simply be Aelis with him at night.

Words had failed him - what could he even begin to say to her after everything that had happened? - but she had smiled at him anyway as he scrambled to his feet, her lips curving in that way that always made his spine tingle.

 _Would it make you feel any better if I said that I'm relieved you're not a Warden and therefore not doomed to an untimely death down in the Deep Roads after all?_ she had asked, though the humor in her tone was strained.

With a deep breath, Blackwall opened the door to Aelis' chamber and stepped inside, closing it softly behind him. The upper room smelled sweet, the servants having hung aromatic herbs in strategic places in the rafters to keep the musty smell of old wood and damp roof tiles away, and the air was comfortably warm. The only sound Blackwall could hear, as he paused in the short stairwell that lead up to floor level in the tower room, was the crackling of the fire. Was she asleep already? Should he turn back? No, not yet. She had left him with an open invitation. She had left the door open for him, and he could not rest easy until he knew for sure where they stood with one another.

 _So you know, I'm not angry with you,_ Aelis had told him last night in the dim shadows of the stables, crossing the barn floor slowly until she was close enough to touch him. She had looked him in the eyes, wanting him to read the truth of the words there in her expression so there could be no doubt, and yet he still had not dared to believe her. _I've been there,_ she said. _I understand better than most what it's like to hate what you are, what you've done, to be willing to do anything to escape it. Before I met you, I would have done the same. If there's no hope for you, Thom Rainier, there can be none for me either._

He had begun to protest this, but Aelis had only shaken her head slightly; she wasn't finished. She had reached out a hand, her fingertips brushing his beard and settling on his cheek, her thumb tracing the orbit of his cheekbone. It had felt both comfort and exquisite agony at the same time to have craved that touch so much and yet feel to feel so unworthy of it when it was bestowed on him.

 _I gave you the chance that was given to me when I joined the Inquisition,_ she had told him. _I know you're not happy with my methods, but it turns out that I'm no better than anyone else when someone I love is in danger. I'll work on that. I'm done with the life I had before this. You can be done with it, too._

She had shifted there in the light of his fire, her expression growing earnest. Words had never been easy for her, and she struggled to find the right ones to say.

 _You're needed here. You can start over, with the Inquisition and with me, if that's what you want. It won't change the past, but you can help me make sure there's a future._ She had gestured at the barn door, then. _All those people out there? Whatever they say, they really don't care if it's a couple of murderers that saves them, they just want to be saved. It's going to be hard. And it's a choice you have to make for yourself. Think on it. My door is open._

And then, without waiting for a reply, she had kissed him on the cheek and left him alone, the imprint of her lips burning on his face. And now Blackwall was here standing on her stairs, preparing himself to see her again. The timbers creaked very softly as he climbed the final handful of steps to the floor of the chamber.

Aelis was not asleep. She stood facing the fireplace, her arms crossed over her chest, her back turned so that most of it faced him. Her auburn hair was still bound up into a bun and held in place with a carved wooden pin. He'd whittled that for her in the first days of their romance. He had little enough to give her, but he had wanted her to have some token from him anyway and had been gratified when she had taken to wearing it whenever she was at Skyhold. One end was crudely shaped into the eagle-beaked head of a gryffon. The yew wood matched the dun silk of her court tunic and breeches, their cut and color severe and ascetic as befitted the commander of a religious order. That she still wore his gift made his heart leap with hope.

From the sliver of her face and brow that he could see, she appeared to be deep in her own thoughts, and Blackwall debated interrupting her from them. Before he could decide one way or the other, she turned and walked the few steps to the foot of her bed, stretching, and still apparently oblivious to his presence. Blackwall's eyes were captivated by the arch of her sides and silhouette, the flexing of those long fingers, and he could not remember what he had planned to say to greet her. She turned away, presenting her back again, and began to work with something in front of her. Blackwall felt his face redden and his heart freeze as he realized she was undressing, unfastening the clasps of her tunic and beginning to slip it off.

Time seemed to stop dead. His tongue felt as if it had turned to clay, his feet to iron. Blackwall watched her bare shoulders flex, working out the stiffness from sore muscles. She trained daily, just like any other soldier, and she never stinted or allowed herself to be coddled so she ached right along with the rest of the army every night. Even before their tryst in the stables, they had sat in front of the fire here more than once rubbing the tension out of each other's backs and shoulders. The memory was hot in his mind as he stared at her now and his fingertips itched for the feel of her skin.

He could count every scar and bruise that marked and puckered her pale flesh. Fresh, dark lacerations bloomed across the ribs on her right side. Those had not been there when last he had seen her like this. Who had been by her side on the field while he was gone? Cassandra? Iron Bull? Not a single member of Aelis' inner circle would hesitate to put their lives on the line for her, and they were all formidable fighters by now, but it worried him when he was not there to protect her personally.

"You could come in and help me with these damned laces," Aelis suggested suddenly, breaking the silence. Her voice jolted him from his thoughts and he heard her faint giggling as he startled. She had evidently been aware of him the whole time. She could be tricky that way.

"I'm sorry, my lady. I should have knocked," he murmured, embarrassed, and instantly averted his gaze. Aelis turned just enough that - when he dared to glance up once more - he could see her smiling at him. She had always enjoyed teasing him, and he had always enjoyed letting her. The familiarity in her tone was balm to him, loosening his serious resolve, but he was still cautious. She gestured him to approach with a nod of her head, and then turned back to finish tugging the tunic sleeve off of her arm and toss it aside onto the bed.

"I've been the only ruffian on these stairs lately. It's not as entertaining," she replied, and glanced back, smirking and cocking an eyebrow at him. "Are _you_ blushing?"

Cautiously, Blackwall stepped towards her, each footfall bringing him closer and making his heart gallop faster in his chest. He _was_ blushing. She was nearly bare from the waist up, save for her cloth breast-band, and he drank in the sight of her - imagined tracing the angled feminine taper of her hips to her waist and the graceful line of her spine that divided the athletic swells of back and shoulder muscles. Her body was firm, hardened from years of constant fighting. And yet, she had been soft for him there in the shadows of the hayloft, her flesh yielding to his touch, the bite and growl of a warrior Inquisitor lost beneath the primal ecstasy of a woman in the arms of her lover for the first time. That night had never left him, torturing him in the damp darkness of his cell and leaping into his mind now as he looked upon her again, his face burning with the memory.

"I can come back later," he told her, because he could not think of a way to answer her question without sounding a fool.

"Help me with this," she replied, gently now, raising a hand to point down her back towards the laces that kept her breast-band bound securely.

He stared at the knotted laces, frustrated, but magnificently so. He drew in a breath and moved close enough to her that he could reach up to grasp the end of one of the linen ties, and pulled gently. The bow of the knot smoothly and steadily shrunk, before quickly releasing as he tugged the twisted fabric. She didn't need his help, he knew. This was an invitation. His knuckle brushed the warmth of her skin, and he was the one who flinched. She did not move, waiting for him to finish, but he noticed the small hairs at the nape of her neck rise a little. Steeling himself, Blackwall moved his hands to the second knot.

"I was thinking about what you told me last night," he said to her, forcing himself to concentrate on the words as his hands worked. Aelis turned her head slightly, though not enough for him to see her expression. He continued hesitantly. "About staying."

This knot was more stubborn. Blackwall carefully picked it loose, the distraction welcome as he composed his thoughts. He could feel her listening, thought the only sound in the room was the popping of pine sap in the fireplace.

"I'll see this through, no matter what," he vowed, earnestly. "Whatever happens between us, I'm the Inquisition's man. I want you to know that."

The knot disengaged under his fingers and the garment relaxed, loosening. The part of his mind that could not ignore her body imagined the movement of her breasts as they were released from their bindings, and Blackwall had to bite his lip to keep himself concentrated and in the present, even has he felt his own body wakening and responding with vigor. Aelis shifted a little, exhaling, and then nodded, waiting to see what he would do next.

Blackwall steeled himself. Now was the moment he had been dreading most. She was not making it easy - it would never have been easy anyway, but she was making it more difficult than he could ever have imagined. He was sorely tempted to abandon his reservations, to wrap his arms around her and press his lips to her neck and shoulder, to let the animal urge override all and give in. She clearly wanted him to. She was giving him every opportunity to do so. And yet - and yet.

"Is this really what you want, Aelis?" he sighed, the words slipping from his mouth before he could substitute them for the prepared speech he had been turning over in his mind all day. With the damage done, he leaned his brow to rest against the copper strands of her hair and closed his eyes, his hands resting on her solid shoulders. She did not move away from him though he could feel her draw in a deep breath. "Maker knows you deserve so much better. Can you love me, truly, knowing who I am and what I've done? I couldn't live with myself if I hurt you again. If you're not sure-"

She turned then. He couldn't look at her, his eyes remained closed, but he felt her hand on his cheek, her palms smoothing the ruff of his beard, and felt the touch of her lips softly on his brow and the bridge of his nose. Her cheek pressed back against his, warm, her breath light on his ear.

"I," she enunciated, slowly and with great emphasis on each word, "am not afraid of Thom Rainier." Her final word on the subject.

And so he kissed her, his arms wrapping around her tightly and felt his last reservations drop away as she responded avidly. Aelis' body pressed against his as perfectly and easily as if they had never been parted. He never wanted to be parted from her again. She purred against his temple as he moved on from her lips to kiss her jaw and then the soft place at the joining of her neck that he had discovered never failed to elicit a gasp. The sound of pleasure, the feel of her body both tightening with need and yielding ecstatically to his touch at the same time was the final confirmation. Blackwall let his mind submerge under the tidal current of desire as she pulled him towards the bed. Her breath against his neck felt like sparks running across his flesh, as if he were a man made of tinder and she was fanning him into flame.

It was only the second time, but the first felt like an age ago and it had been tinged with sorrow and regret. Blackwall felt as if his hands had taken on a life of their own, roaming her skin, pulling away the fabric of her bindings and cupping full breasts. He allowed her to help him shuck his own clothes, her fingers grasping the hair of his chest, the feel of her kisses on his shoulders and belly inflaming him until he feared that he might burst. He lowered her, spreading her across the coverlet, and eased her from her breeches and smallclothes. Her blue eyes followed him, her lips parting, as she lay exposed before him. He had bedded dozens of women in his time, but this was his woman, and that alone - beyond the Mark on her hand, beyond the stories of the Herald, beyond any of her accomplishments since - made her miraculous to him.

Crawling over her, covering her, he kissed calf and muscular thigh, tracing her hip and belly with his lips, pressing his nose against the rise of her breasts. He savored her, as he had not been able to do the last time. The humid, exotic, animal musk of flesh and hair and the earthy womanly scent overtook his brain as he followed the channel between her breasts to rest his face against the angled hollow of her shoulder.

"I love you," he told her, his fingers lacing with hers along the bedclothes as he covered the greenish sigil of her marked palm with his own dense hand, feeling long, strong legs wrap around his waist. He hadn't told her before, not with words. He would tell her now, so there could be no mistake.

"I love you, too," she replied, a sigh of both reief and need. She had been a virgin before, though he had not known it until the critical moment. There was no momentary resistance now as - with one electrified push - he entered her. The world seemed to roar around him, and he realized it was their own voices he was hearing.

When the thrashing of limbs and the rush of ecstatic blood and breath had reached their climax and settled once more, Blackwall lay spent and sweating on the coverlet with Aelis curled into the crook of his arm. Her hair had come loose, cloaking her shoulders with fiery tendrils. She toyed languorously with the dark mat of his chest hair as his heartbeat began to slow and the world took on the drowsy afterglow of sex. He looked down at his lover and saw her shift a little and open an eye, stormy grey-blue twinkling up at him in the candle light.

"I _do_ love you," he told her, earnestly. There had been lies before. He wanted her to know that there would be no lies now - that there _could_ be no lies about this. She stretched like a cat and propped herself up on one elbow, smiling at him. He'd lost his heart to that smile, no less now than the first time he'd seen it.

"And I you. And so that's that," she replied and tilted her cheek into the palm of his hand, sighing with pleasure as he caressed the strong line of her jaw with his thumb. "I thought I'd lost you. I'm glad I didn't."

Blackwall turned slightly to run a hand over her side, carefully avoiding her bruises. He wanted to map her body, measure its curves and recesses. Now that he'd been granted this redemption, he never wanted to forget it.

"What happens now?" he asked her. Her fingers moved up from his chest hair to tweak his beard fondly.

"Well, everyone knows about us, so there no use in sneaking around anymore for one thing," she told him, humorously. She looked down for a moment, before turning her gaze back to him. "What do you want to happen?"

He thought about this briefly, brushing a stray strand of hair from her brow, and then made a decision. Nothing was certain. They could win this war. They could lose it. Either or both of them could die on any one of their missions in the field. Even if they survived this, she was noble and he was not. There were politics to think of. Marriage would likely be out of the question. But none of that made a difference to him. _Whatever happens, it won't change this_ , she had once told him, reassuring him with a kiss.

"As long as we're together, that's enough for me," he told her. Her perfect lips tipped further upward for a moment, and then a thought seemed to occur to her.

"What should I call you now? Thom?"

Blackwall couldn't help wincing a little at the name. How long had it been since he had left it behind? How much had he hurt inside every day since it had been resurrected? But, she didn't mean to hurt him. And it was a valid question. People would have to call him something. He considered.

"It's been a long time since anyone called me that. I've been Blackwall for so long that it doesn't even feel like my own name anymore."

"The way I see it," Aelis replied, carefully, kindly, "That Rainier is gone. He died that day up on the headland on the Storm Coast. And Warden Blackwall is gone, too. But, the Blackwall I know, he's still here. Like when they name a new baby, they name it in honor of someone, a family member or friend or a hero. Someone they want the child to grow up to be like."

"Like a title," he mused, catching her drift. She had always been sharp. He sounded the name in his head. It felt right. Fitting. He nodded. "Blackwall, then. A reminder."

The hour was growing late, the candles burning down. Aelis yawned. It would be another long day tomorrow - there was a war to win, a world to save. It was going to be hard for him for a long while, as his erstwhile friends tried to come to terms with the reality of Thom Rainier, but he would weather it - gladly - for Aelis. She sat up on the side of the bed and turned to look at him over her shoulder. The impishness of her eyes, the way her hair fell, and the suggestiveness of the posture melted Blackwall inside. He never wanted take his eyes off of her again.

"Stay tonight," she told him, and he nodded his agreement. He watched as she crossed the floor, naked, her barefeet padding on the stone and thick carpets, to draw the curtains and toss another log on the fire. He loved the way she moved both in and out of her clothes. For all her soldierly swagger, she had an unselfconscious grace to her when she wasn't paying attention that he never got tired of watching.

Aelis returned and drew down the rumpled bedclothes, pinching out the bedside candle and plunging the room into deeper darkness. Blackwall slid himself under the covers and felt the warmth of her skin contact his as she did the same. She snuggled comfortably against him, resting her palm - its green glow quiescent - on his chest, and he kissed the crown of her head, feeling at peace for the first time in a very long time. The stillness of the night began to settle over them, and he closed his eyes, letting his breathing slow as his head sank into the soft pillow.

"You had better be here when I wake up this time, Blackwall, or Corypheus will be the least of your problems," Aelis murmured sleepily in the darkness, and he couldn't stop himself from laughing, hearing her chuckle mingle with his. It was the last piece falling into place to let him know that everything was alright between them.

"I promise," he told her.

And he was there when she woke up - the next morning, and the morning after, and most of their mornings following. And, despite the difficulties of the days to come - of battles, of the suspicion of his comrades as they tried to determine how to act towards him - Blackwall knew that he was, at last, himself and home.


	8. Epilogue: The Angel of Death

_This was written before Trespasser came out. I haven't played it yet, but I've heard things. Things that displease me. I debated going back and changing elements of this epilogue to fit more with the DLC, but screw it. I like my ending better._

* * *

 _I believe that, in the end, the truth will conquer. ~ John Wycliffe_

The sunny patch of ground between the stables and the kitchens remained Thom Rainier's favorite place in the fortress of Skyhold. The walk grew a little longer every year that passed - his knees and back were not what they had once been after fifty years of fighting and it was rare that he could make the trip without pausing to rest a few times - but it was a daily ritual that he was not willing to forgo.

What had once been a training yard was now a small garden, the soil turned and planted with the heavy heads of snowbell and white Andraste's Grace. A stone bench sat under the shade of a gnarled oak and it was here that Thom eased himself down, wincing at the complaints of old bones and war injuries, stooping forward slightly to lean more comfortably on the knob of his walking stick.

Had it really been twenty years since this spot had last hosted the bustle of the Inquisition's horses and soldiers and stablehands? Across the way, the old stables and paddocks still stood, though less crammed and busy than they had once been. It felt like such a short time ago that Thom - Blackwall then - had called the barn home, sleeping in the loft between field missions and spending his evenings around his small fire or in the rowdy tavern. He missed it sometimes, the sounds of the horses, the smell of the hay, and the glimpse of frosty stars overhead through the hatch. He had not been sorry to make the move to living permanently with Aelis in her tower chamber when the time had come, but now and then he had still snuck down to the barn to lay in the hay loft and remember. Even better the times when Aelis had found him there - she had always known how to find him - and joined him, curling up beside him in the straw and teasing him about the early days of their courtship.

Twenty years. The Inquisition had accomplished its mission. The Breach was dissipated, Corypheus defeated. There had been other battles, demons and darkness aplenty. The work of heroes was never done. The circle of companions that Aelis had gathered around her during those years had held together for a time, but most had gone off to lead their own lives eventually. Varric was viscount in Kirkwall. Cole had returned to the Fade, slipping away as enigmatically as he had come. Iron Bull, free of the Qun, was off with the Chargers finding new battles to fight. Dorian was Archon in Tevinter now and, according to all accounts, enjoying himself immensely as he rooted out the corrupt magisters and rained witty repartee down on his political enemies. Cullen and Josephine, to everyone's surprise, had married in the end. They had remained at Skyhold for as long as they could, but eventually Josephine had been called back home to manage her family estates and business interests. They wrote regularly and seemed happy and prosperous enough in Antiva. Three children had followed.

Cassandra had been installed as the Most Holy Divine Victoria, and had immediately set about restoring order with her customary vigor and intensity. _La Sainte Terreur_ , they called her. The Templars and the Seekers flourished under her reforms. With Grand Enchanter Vivienne continuing as the head of the Circle and Leliana wielding her influence as the Left Hand, the Circle was beginning to see the reforms it needed as well. In the end, as unlikely as it had seemed, Aelis and Cassandra had become friends. The struggle to defeat Corypheus had changed both of them. Their differences put aside in service of a greater goal, they had discovered that they were not so very different after all.

In the end, only Sera and Thom had remained, and the elven prankster was never one to let the dust gather. She came and went like a cat, sowing mischief in her wake, but she always called Skyhold home. All of the children who had grown up at the castle in the years following the Breach had heard of the antics and tales of Red Jenny from an early age. Thom, content to be wherever Aelis was, had eventually become Skyhold's warder, seeing to the military affairs of the fortress and guarding the mountain pass that had become a well-traveled trade route through the Frostbacks.

Aelis had never intended for the Inquisition to become a permanent institution. _What good is an Inquisitor when there's nothing interesting left to inquire about?_ Thom could remember her saying, in her growly way. Like many Marchers, she had an innate suspicion of those who held the reins of power too tightly, and more than once she had underlined her plan to quietly disappear from public life once everything was over with.

 _They'll never let me alone,_ she had told him, scowling. _I'll have people hanging around here trying to get me to solve their problems forever more. And there's already some fool trying to have the Chantry declare me a saint or something. Can you imagine? Saint Aelis the Inquisitor, patroness of avalanches and inconvenient coincidences? No thank you._

When the last rift in the Fade was healed, when the last of the Red Templars and rogue mages were rounded up, when the Chantry was restored and there was no further need for a heavy hand to keep the institutions of Thedas in check, Aelis - with Cassandra's blessing - had declared the Inquisition at an end, and not a moment too soon. Neither Orlais nor Ferelden were pleased to have an army on their doorstep. Aelis' practical, no-nonsense brand of diplomacy soothed their fears, though it allowed the Empress and King Alistair to once again turn their ire back to each other.

By that time, Thom had been Aelis' paramour for nearly two years and the only constant in both of their lives was each other. He'd regained his name, clear now in the eyes of the law, and had tried to make amends with those he had harmed. Aelis had done the same, and even reconciled with her family in Ostwick. It had been nearly a decade since she had seen them or the Free Marches. Though there had been letters and forgiveness, she had confessed to him that she did not think she would ever be able to return to Ostwick. There were too many painful memories there to relive, too many reminders of her life before the Inquisition, too much guilt in the wake of her brother's death at the Conclave.

In the end, they had decided to travel to Orlais to join the Grey Wardens, who were trying to rebuild their numbers and their honor there while the difficulties at Weisshaupt were playing out. Despite the danger and the difficulty of the life the Wardens offered, it had seemed only fitting. They had both intended to join in the past and it would provide them some small amount of anonymity and a cause to work towards. That plan too had had to be abandoned after the unexpected discovery, a few weeks before they were to leave, that Aelis was pregnant.

A slight breeze riffled through the glade, tugging at the fringes of Thom's beard, grown hoary white now these many years. He smoothed it, smiling at the memory. In all of his life up to that point, he had never imagined that he would be a father. His service in the army had kept him away from home too often and the burdens of home and family hadn't appealed to him at that time. After his disgrace, he had been a fugitive for a long awhile, and after that he had been too ashamed to even consider the possibility that he could be fatherly when it had been his orders that had cut short the lives of another man's children. Yet, it was Aelis who had taken the news the hardest. She could face down a horde of enemies and never flinch, she had stood up to an ancient Magister darkspawn and a dragon without fear, but the prospect of motherhood sent her into a full on panic.

 _I can't be anyone's mother_ , she had insisted anxiously as she paced the floor of their chamber. _What am I going to do, strap it to my backplate while I'm out killing darkspawn and demons? It'll come out swearing and demanding a mug of ale. It'll grow up thinking that all this is normal. Maker's balls, it'll grow up to be like me._

Thom had risen from his perch on the end of the bed and pulled her, her shoulders shivering, into an embrace. _We'll manage_ , he had told her. And they had. Aelis had become the permanent castellan of Skyhold - by then a legal freehold under the auspices of the Chantry between the Orlesian and Ferelden borders and a popular place to conduct trade and diplomacy between the two countries - and they had married. Some months after that, their daughter Lydia had been born and then there had been two women that Thom was utterly besotted with instead of just one.

She was perfect, his Liddy, in every way that it was possible for a child to be perfect and it never ceased to amaze him that he could have helped create something so beautiful and good. When Aelis had proposed naming her after the sister he had lost in childhood, it was as if the events of his life had finally come full circle and he could see what it had all led up to.

She had grown up into a tall, fair dark-haired young woman just as her namesake might have, with her mother's impish blue eyes and teasing wit. No doubt she was even now breaking dozens of hearts up in Ostwick where she was attending school and being brought out into society by her Trevelyan relatives. His own heart was among those broken for her being so far away, but she would be the lady of Skyhold when she came of age and so needed a better education than what the remote castle could offer. Aelis would have scoffed at the idea of a daughter of hers as a society noblewoman, but Liddy was no demure damsel either and Thom knew that her mother would have been proud of the girl all the same.

It had been an assassin's poisoned blade that had taken Aelis from him in the end. After surviving the disaster at the Conclave, the avalanche at Haven, the nightmare of the Fade, and Corypheus, she had seemed nearly indestructible. True to form, her last act had been to snap her attacker's neck before succumbing to her wounds on the floor of the bedchamber she had been staying in while on a visit to Val Royeaux. The poison had already done its work by the time help arrived and she was gone. Even the best of Leliana's efforts had not revealed the name of the person who had hired the assassin or the reason for the murder. It remained a mystery.

Aelis' death had crippled Thom for a time. Both of them had understood, without needing to say it, that death would always be as close as the next fight and so they had loved furiously, making a point never to let disagreements or hurt feeling linger. The last words he had spoken to her had been ones of love, and so there was nothing there at the end to regret except that he hadn't been there on that particular trip to protect her. Losing her had gutted him all the same. She was the rock on which he had rebuilt his life. With her gone, it was as if the ground had fallen out from under him and the sun had gone out. But, there was Liddy to raise. She had been six years old then and unable to fully comprehend the tragedy, only that her mother was not coming home. For his daughter, he had picked himself up and continued on.

Sera had returned to the castle, stepping in to take on the role of a sort of surrogate aunt, for which Thom was profoundly grateful.

 _I know what it's like to not have a mum_ , the elven rogue had told him. _And no one can hold a candle to her mum. Can't teach her swords or how to make cookies or anything, but she's going to need someone around to teach her how to have fun if she's got a broody-beard like you for a father. May as well be me._

In time, the crushing pain had faded and he had been able to remember the good times again. For ten years, he had had everything he had ever truly wanted in his life - everything that the pride and greed and carousing of his past had never been able to provide him. In addition to her love, Aelis had given him back himself as he had always wanted to be. She had given him forgiveness and helped him allow himself to be forgiven. And, in forgiving him, she had finally been able to forgive herself for the horrors in her own past. Even if their time had been too short, she would have wanted him to hold on to that instead of breaking under his grief, and so that was what Thom tried to do, though he missed her daily.

Sometimes, he thought that he could still feel the subtle sensation of her fingers caressing his beard or the soft touch of her lips to his cheek in the dead of night. Now and then, when walking the corridors of the castle, out of the corner of his eyes, he would glimpse a flash of red that was the same color as her hair and find it gone as soon as he turned to look, or hear the distant echo of a voice that reminded him of hers. Perhaps, it was hers. When he visited the garden that had been planted in her memory, it was easier to feel that she was still there, just outside of his skin, nearby if not explicitly present. Aelis had never believed in the Maker, but if her soul had rested somewhere, it was likely to be here; near to the people and the place that she had loved.

 _Do you ever wonder what would have happened if we hadn't met that day? If I'd left Haven a day too late or gotten held up on the road and you'd already gone off somewhere?_ she had asked him once. They had just made love, the covers twined loosely around them, and there was snow falling outside of the tall windows. Thom, laying on his side facing her, tracing the curve of her side, had let his hand move down to rest on her belly and the newly noticeable bulge of his child growing there under her heart. He had had taken her hand in his and kissed her calloused fingers, before gathering her into his arms and kissing her scarred brow.

 _Never_ , he had replied. And he didn't. It was inconceivable now to think of a life without her in it. Sometimes he felt as if he had never truly begun to live at all until she had come along _._

The sun was lower now in the sky, the change in the light signaling to Thom that it was time to begin the long limp back to the main hall before dinner. He stood, wincing and leaning on his stick, and sighed. There was always something that needed his attention in the fortress, but it was time well invested. Liddy would be returning home within the year, old enough now to take up her mother's mantle at Skyhold, and Thom wanted everything to be perfect for her when she arrived.

He crossed the manicured garden lawn to the statue that stood next to the wall, backed by the pale stars of climbing jasmine flowers. The figure was as familiar as his own face: a tall woman in plate armor bearing the Inquisition's burning eye sigil, her bearing military, a long greatsword clasped point down between her fists. The smile on her scarred face was as vivid as it had been in life. The sculptor had been a stonesmith at Skyhold during the Inquisition and had done the piece full justice. Thom did not have to read the words inscribed around the base of the pedestal in remembrance of her deeds. He had been there. He knew them all by heart.

"She's fine. She'll be home soon," Thom told the statue of his wife as he did every day, trusting that Aelis - wherever she was now - would know. "We miss you."

His large hand, the skin now creased and spotted with age, rested over her stone fists for just a moment before he turned to leave. "Good night, love."

The way back to the main hall always seemed longer with its many stone steps and a day was coming, Thom knew, when he would not be able to make the journey anymore. But not yet. He would see Liddy settled in her place at Skyhold - perhaps even married, if her affections for Cullen and Josephine's eldest boy continued past this youthful stage. She needed him, and he could no more refuse her than he had ever been able to refuse her mother. And when his life was done, he would rejoin Aelis and they would go on to the next adventure together, hand in hand, as they had since the beginning.

* * *

 _Thanks for reading!_


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